


Homeward Bound

by ThePoetTree



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Anders Was Right, Dealing With Trauma, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Happy Ending, F/F, F/M, Fix-It, Fluff and Angst, Healing, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Slow Burn, Smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2020-08-20 07:35:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 54,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20224186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePoetTree/pseuds/ThePoetTree
Summary: After the events of Kirkwall, a broken Anders and a tired Amell meet in the vineyards of Antiva. They decide to travel together, at least until such time their paths diverge. [Revised!]





	1. Two Letters

**Author's Note:**

> This is basically the Warden and Anders meeting at the end of DA2 and their adventures throughout the following years. There's not much plot, considering it kinda happens off-screen, and this is mostly character-driven. I just want my poor mages to have a happy ending.  
If you see any mistakes let me know!

9:35 Dragon

“_Dear Anders,_

_I hope this letter finds you well. I will not bore you with details of the darkspawn’s comings and goings, for I doubt you care much for them. I will however mention the two young mages I met on the road to Denerim, Elladan and Mary, freshly escaped from Kirkwall’s Gallows. I am pleased to report that they are both well and that they assured me they had never met anyone by your name or description._

_Don’t get caught, Anders. I doubt I would be able to help this time._

_Yet I do not put pen to paper to gossip. I simply wish to inform you that I, by this letter, officially release you from duty to the Grey -in as much as one can leave this fate._

_I understand you saw the Wardens as a safe haven from the politics of the Circle; and I must apologize for my oversight regarding the Templars infiltrating our ranks. As a consequence of that incident, you will not be asked to rejoin our Order. My song growing louder, I cannot know how long I will wield any authority within Grey Warden rank, but as long as I do, you have my assurance that we will not look for you. Though I suspect it means little after the circumstances of your departure._

_Enclosed are a number of spells you might find useful, as well as recipes for a number of poultices. May they serve you well._

_With my kindest regards,_

_Warden Commander Amell_”

Anders had not expected an owl of all things to swoop down on him with a letter in its beak, but it was signed by Warden Commander Amell so he did his best to ignore the unconventional delivery method. The woman knew enough wild magic to make a courier owl seemed almost mundane. Her writing was delicate, a round cursive at odds with his memory of her; his unyielding, secretive, and very dangerous Commander.

He allowed himself a smile at the mention of Elladan and Mary. He had, in fact, helped them escape the Gallows -without news in over six months, he had begun to worry.

He read her apology with a frown. Over the years, he had come to understand that nothing, not even the Hero of Ferelden herself, could stop the Templars from chasing their prey. He had, at his lowest points, cursed the Grey Wardens to the Void for everything they had done to him, but had never blamed his Commander in particular.

That the damned Templars had such a hard-on for putting shackles on him was hardly her fault.

He had always had an inkling that the Grey Wardens had let him go too easily; no one had chased after him, no one had tried to track him down. At least, that mystery was now solved, and although it brought him some relief -one less group of people to run away from, he could not help but yearn for easier days, when Sigrun and Nathaniel teamed up to fill his bedroll with ants and Oghren shared ever stranger stories of the Blight and his most pressing worry was what new way the lot of them would find to injure themselves.

To this day, the palm was Oghren’s, who had somehow managed to tear muscles in his chest from coughing too hard.

The spells and recipes were carefully written in her hand; he wondered how long it had taken her. He coursed through them conscientiously: spells of concealment, protection, some curses he wished never to know the provenance of, glyphs of entrapment, potions of healing, of dreamless sleep, poisons from foreign lands… Amell had to know what he was doing in Kirkwall. More than that, she was helping him for afar.

He did not know whether it was a good thing or not.

He remembered her as a young woman, barely twenty, eyes sharp as Isabella’s blades. Stubborn, and always planning something. In her more relaxed moments, she had had a tongue to match his and a great hand at Wicked Grace, which had made him think that maybe, in a different world, they could have been friends.

Justice’s memories bled into his own; a dear friend, wise and curious. The thought caught him by surprise. She had always helped when he had needed it, but he was not sure they had ever been friends -he had always been kept at arm’s length. Justice remembered her differently, his memories of her warm and respectful. Scenes that were not of his own making played in Anders’ mind. Amell and Justice chatting long into the night, Amell arguing about the meaning of Justice, Amell trying to explain human emotions… Anders reached for the scarf she had given him one day when the wind had blown sharper than usual. Years of service had taken their toll on it, yet he still wore it, a soft rampart against the cold winters of the Free Marches.

He wondered if she was alright, as she made no mention of her health in the letter. Maybe she thought he did not care. The allusion to her Calling made his stomach clench, slapping him with the horrifying truth that one day he would hear it too. He shook his head, trying to forget about the letter, the memories that were not quite his, and the Grey Wardens.

He went back to work. His last batch of elfroot was not going to boil itself.

9:37 Dragon

Anders destroyed the Kirkwall Chantry and died fighting Hawke, protecting the mages of the Gallows against the holy rage of the Templar Order.

He could have ran, hidden, survived. But the thought of stepping aside had sickened him, and he had known what had to be done, Justice roaring inside of him. Some fights demanded to be fought. As Hawke stepped into that courtyard, angry as he had never seen her before, he knew he would die. It did not bother him much, not anymore, not after everything. He could still delay them, hold them off until, maybe, some mages escaped. His life for theirs, the easiest of choices.

As he bled out on the steps of the Gallows, drained of all mana, his last thought was for those he could not save.

He woke where he had fallen, a headache menacing to split his head in two. The sky had darkened, filled with smoke and distant battle shouts. With uncertain hands, he felt the place where Hawke’s blade had struck at his heart. His coat was torn up there and his blood had dried on his skin, but instead of the open wound he had expected, he only felt a knot of scar tissue, hard and uneven. He was alright.

He was all wrong. Empty, halved, carved up. Bile rose up in his throat, understanding shattering his heart. Justice was gone; Justice was gone; Justice was gone. Anders closed his eyes, willing his hands to stop shaking, unable to even form coherent thoughts.

Later, much later, as he was spiralling down a dark well of memories hidden in the wilderness around Kirkwall, an owl came to him.

“_Dear Anders,_

_I hope this letter finds you well. From the whispers I have been hearing, you are still trying to change the world one free mage at the time. I shall reiterate my earlier warning: don’t get caught._

_But I write not to discuss politics. I have news, indeed, for I have found a cure for the Taint. It is by no means perfect and I cannot know for certain the effect it will have on you, but it worked well enough on me. In the package you will find precise instructions for its administration, along with a mild explanation of its workings. Truth be told, I barely understand it myself. I feel the need to warn you, there is a very real chance it may kill you, although I suppose it would technically still cure you of the Taint. I fear this is the best I can do at his hour._

_Note also that, should you survive, it will make you extremely weak to the Taint in the future. I would advise against ever taking a stroll through the Deep Roads again._

_Weisshaupt was not happy with my findings. Consequently, I don’t recommend squandering the dose I am sending you for I doubt any will be distributed in our ranks in the near future. Or the future in general. I’ll add that, as I have lost all influence within Warden ranks, you should avoid any Warden outposts you encounter._

_Try to not die._

_With my kindest regards,_

_Amell_”

She had obviously written the letter before the events in Kirkwall. If she had known, she would not have written at all, much less with the intention of helping him. Not to mention all of Thedas thought him dead anyway.

He read the instructions for the cure dispassionately, understood none of it, and then drank the whole flask. Might as well finish the job.


	2. Over Hill and Under Hill

Coraline Amell was tired. Tired of people, of rules, of gods. She had done her best: stopped a fucking Blight, fixed the fucking Veil, re-established the fucking Grey Wardens in Ferelden, found a cure for the fucking Calling. And yet, the world was just as miserable as before.

She was going to retire. Somewhere quiet, close to Denerim so she could come annoy Alistair anytime, somewhere with a rose garden and a library and no one to ask her to save the world. One could always dream. She stretched her back, sprawled on the big comfortable armchair in Alistair’s private office, half listening to his plans about mage refugees from Kirkwall flooding his port cities.

After finding the cure -she had been so proud of herself then-, she had ran to Weisshaupt to expose her findings. The First Warden had been sceptical at best, and then the first two Wardens that tried it had died in agony. The third had succumbed to the Taint after barely a brush with a shriek, demonstrating that her cure had some downsides after all. It all went wrong after that. They suspected her of deceit already, with the way she had _mysteriously_ survived slaying the Archdemon -the flawed cure had not helped.

In barely three days at the Headquarters, she had ended up locked in the dungeons for endangering Grey Warden secrets. She gritted her teeth at the memory. How could she endanger their secrets when she did not even know half of them?

Of course, she had broken out and of course, she had destroyed half their dungeons in the process. And then, out of spite, she had sent as many vials of the cure as she could produce to her friends in the Wardens. Despite her begging, her bargaining and her straight-up manipulating, Alistair still refused to take his, loyal to the end. She considered slipping some in his evening tea; the only thing stopping her was that he might die before getting the chance of being mad at her.

She needed to perfect the damn thing first.

An official messenger came bearing two letters, interrupting her reveries.

The first from Dairsmuid: Rivella was asking her to consult on a book she was writing. The second was signed R.J., and asserted, through a number of metaphors, that the ancient Tevinter manuscript she had been looking for had been put aside for her in Ayesleigh, a port city on the Southern coast of Rivain. The letter combusted as soon as she finished reading it.

The delivery was timely; with the Chantry aiming to drag her back to the Circles after the debacle at Weisshaupt, her presence in the castle only fuelled tensions between the Fereldan crown and the sunburst throne.

She spared a glance at Alistair, who had stopped ranting about adding taxes on Orlesian goods to doodle absent-mindedly on his map. Her staying in Denerim was, at least for now, making his life a little bit harder.

And so Coraline packed her bags, hugged her friend goodbye, and boarded a ship to Wycome. One more quest, she told herself -one more problem to fix, one more demon to deal with, and then she was done.

She planned to cross Antiva on foot, reaching Rivain in springtime. If anyone was expecting her in Ayesleigh (unlikely, but not impossible), they would wait for her at the docks, neglecting the inland roads. Besides, walking the seldom used paths of the Antivan countryside, she could selfishly ignore the war brewing on the continent. Any illusion of peace would shatter in Dairsmuid, with its religious tensions and the Qun pressing in the North.

* * *

She travelled light, avoiding the main road. As night slowly spread over the land, she searched for shelter in the vineyard hills that lazily rolled over Southern Antiva. Winter had settled down comfortably, the wind now blowing cold and biting; her small tent would not be shelter enough. Pulling her heavy green travel cloak closer, Coraline headed to an opening in a small rocky cliff face at the foot of a hill. Maybe she would have to fight a spider or two but that would be well-worth it to hide from the weather for a night.

To her great displeasure, someone was already inside. His hood obscured his face and she watched warily as he lit a small fire with a wave of his hand. Apostate, then. A lone escapee from the Annulment of the Gallows down south if she was lucky. An insane blood mage if she was not. Sensing himself observed, the man turned to her, staff at the ready. She considered him gingerly, having no intention of killing anyone if she could help it. His stance was familiar, wide and proud, his staff at an angle.

“Amell?” His voice was incredulous and she took a step back, a spell ready to spring from her raised hands. The man lowered his hood.

“Anders?” Her hands fell and her jaw hung open. Yes, there had been the odd rumour that the apostate had been seen fleeing Kirkwall after destroying its Chantry, but rumours did not usually hold up against the word of official messengers and spies. She would need to have a word with Ser Bryland, the Royal Spymaster. “You’re supposed to be dead!”

“It didn’t take.” His eyes did not quite meet hers.

She approached him, reassured that it was just Anders. “What are you doing here?” They were halfway between Ansburg and Antiva City, surrounded by vineyards, small inconsequential hamlets and sparse forests. Hardly a good place to hide.

“Oh, you know. Seeing the sights, admiring the countryside.” He relented under her glare. “I’m fleeing Kirkwall, what do you think I’m doing?”

“Understandable.” Coraline nodded before glancing behind her. The only light was that of the stars. “Mind if I stay?”

He invited her in with a gesture.

Coraline removed her cape and folded it carefully to her side. They sat on opposite sides of the fire, each at a loss for polite conversation. They ate in silence, him cooking a rabbit, her pulling out dried meat from her pack, until Anders seemed unable to contain his curiosity any longer.

“Amell. What are you doing here, exactly?”

“I’m eating diner,” she dead-panned in answer, just like he had minutes earlier. It did not even draw a smile from him.

“I was thinking more generally.”

“I’m going to Rivain.”

“Darkspawn trouble?” Her eyes widened incredulously at the absurd suggestion before remembering he probably still thought of her as a Grey Warden. As his Warden Commander, in fact. She opted for a smooth half-truth.

“Ah, no. I’m simply… visiting a friend. Where are _you_ going?”

“… North.” He seemed so uncertain that her eyebrows rose in infinite sarcasm.

“What are you going to do when you reach the Venefication Sea? Get on a ship to Qunandar?”

“Very funny. Maybe I’ll cross to Tevinter.”

She pursed her lips. “I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Anders studied her as they ate. He had almost failed to recognize her without her Grey Warden armour. The green woollen cloak was one thing, but she had also shed the traditional Warden mage robes, preferring hunting pants and leather armour. Maybe she had the right idea. If mages did not wear robes, how could anyone find them?

She seemed softer without the steel and the blue, at odds with his memories of her, commanding and stern. Her hair had grown longer, gleaming in the light of his small fire. There were some new scars on her, along with some new lines on her face. Her cheeks still blushed a delightful rose, but the circles under her eyes were darker than he remembered.

She did not seem intent of killing him either, which meant she had no idea what had happened in Kirkwall.

“Where’s your cat?” She asked out of the blue, ending his observation.

“What?”

“Your cat,” she said impatiently. “Ser Pounce-a-lot, was it?”

Anders shook his head. He could not believe she remembered. “Of all the things… Why would you ask me that?”

“I don’t know”, she shrugged. “You used to take him everywhere.”

“The Wardens made me get rid of him after you left. I left him with a friend in Amaranthine.”

She sniffled at the fire, whispering “arseholes”. Her vitriol piqued his curiosity. He vaguely remembered a mention of the Wardens in her last letter, but he had lost it when he had accidentally set himself on fire while trying to cook a rat one worse-than-usual evening.

“Did something happen with the Wardens?”

She looked up at him and threw a hand in the air with a scowl. “They threw me out. Long story short, Weisshaupt is missing his dungeons and half its stables. We’re not on good terms.”

Anders took a second to respond, his tone more incredulous than amused when he finally did. “I didn’t see that one coming.”

“Neither did I.”

They went to sleep on opposite sides of the little cave. Anders woke first, his nights even more restless since Justice had left him. Under the languid light of the morn, he looked to Amell who was still fast asleep, disappearing completely under her large cape.

The sight took him back years, when Oghren used to throw pebbles at her to wake her up. He was the only one allowed to do that, of course -anyone else would very surely had been stuck on latrine duty for the rest of their lives, in addition to being set on fire on the spot.

Leaving her here would be easy; she would not even stir as he walked out. He revived the fire instead. She woke as he moved the embers around, grumbling incoherently under her cape. Her hair was a tousled mess, her eyes soft with sleep.

“Good morning,” he greeted her politely. Her response was lost in a yawn. Anders watched her as she tried to comb her hair with her fingers unsuccessfully and rummaged through her pack. He barely caught the loaf of bread she threw him.

“You look like shite,” she said by way of explanation.

“Not too good yourself,” he mumbled without heart before munching on the bread. He had to admit the food was welcome. Better than rats and the odd rabbit in any case.

She yawned loudly, stretching like a lazy cat. Then, she stopped moving mid-stretch, as if remembering something important. “You blew up a Chantry,” she said, her words cutting in the quiet of the morn.

He lowered his head. So she knew. Maybe she had not killed him before to avoid having to sleep next to a corpse. He knew he should have left while she was still asleep.

“I did.” He would have tried to defend himself, but he simply did not have the energy required. He had accepted his death long before she came, only lacking the willpower to act himself.

“I wish I’d been there,” she sniffled after a while. “I bet it looked pretty. Did it have fireworks?”

“I- No, I’m afraid not.”

“Shame. Blasphemy’s always better with fireworks.”

Anders’ brain collapsed in on itself and he only managed to say, very slowly, “… Sorry to disappoint?”

“It’s fine, I’ll get over it.” She rolled her eyes dramatically. “Next time, warn me before hand so I can at least throw a party.”

When Anders finally formed some questions to ask her (‘_what the fuck_’ being the first), she had already changed the subject to varieties of Antivan wine. He did not dare change it back and munched on his bread instead, doing his very best to not think at all, because this day made absolutely no sense.

Coraline was quick enough to put the few pieces she had together: Anders helping the mage rebellion in Kirkwall, chatter in Val Royeau about an Annulment, Leliana’s comments about the Grand Cleric, Knight-Commander Stannard’s stranglehold on the city… If she was not sure what had prompted Anders of all people to blow up a Chantry, she understood what had been achieved well enough.

The only puzzling thing about the entire situation was Anders himself. She remembered him as someone who, despite hating Chantry oversight, saw any fight for freedom as, in his own words, ‘a recipe for disaster’. She had kept a polite distance after hearing that, not wanting to get dragged into an argument about mage politics with one of her subordinates. The fact remained that his words then stood in complete opposition with his recent actions, and questions about this change of heart burned on her lips, begging to be asked.

But Anders seemed as destroyed as the Chantry he had turned to rubble, so she made jokes instead.

She finished packing first and waited for Anders. He was shouldering his bag when it dawned on her that he did not serve under her command anymore, and that she did not need to wait for him. Force of habit be damned, she was far too used to having travelling companions.

“Which way are you going?” She asked as they stepped out of the cave. The wind had died down somewhat and the sky bright and clear. Anders pointed to a line of trees to the North. She hummed. “Me too.”

Anders wanted to protest at her unsaid suggestion but could not find any good reasons to. “I’m an apostate,” he insisted feebly.

“So am I, you know. I’m not a Grey Warden anymore, so I’m back to being Chantry property,” she explained, catching him off guard once again.

“You’re joking, right? I can’t imagine King Alistair-”

“You know as well as I do the Chantry supersedes the monarchy. And they have been very clear where my place was.” Even half-awake and rusty on human interaction, Anders could see anger simmering in her eyes, behind her casual tone.

“You’re the Hero of Ferelden. Stopped a Blight and everything! You’d think that would afford you some leniency!”

“The Chantry disagrees. I am to ‘face judgement for my crimes’.” She even did the air-quotes, rolling her eyes.

“What crimes? Saving the world?” Anders tried to pretend the news did not enrage him. If even the Hero of Ferelden had to bow to the Chantry, how could anyone hope to resist them?

“Don’t you know what happened in Kinloch before I got conscripted?” Anders thought back to these years but came up empty. She had never talked about the Circle when he was with the Wardens and he had not cared about anything but escaping at the time.

“I figured you impressed the recruiter.”

That made her chortle. “I was helping a friend escape. We managed to destroy all the phylacteries in the Tower, but Templars were waiting for us on the way out. We took down maybe a dozen of them and my friend escaped. He was impressed alright.”

“How have I never heard of this?” Granted, he had just been released from solitary at the time and had not been in a very stable mood, but this should have been the talk of the Tower. “Who was the friend?”

“Jowan. Short, dark hair, really shitty at anything involving potions.”

“I remember him! Good on him for getting out.” Jowan had been quite a few years younger than him and late to his Harrowing. Not particularly powerful, not particularly bright, and still an apprentice well into his twenties. Chances were he would have been made Tranquil had he not managed to escape. Justice would have been glad to hear Amell’s story, he thought, his heart constricting.

“Well, he did end up poisoning Earl Eamon and sparking the destruction of half of Redcliffe. Not to mention his fiancée got sent to Aeonar.” For a split second, Anders thought she was joking, but she did not smile.

“Never let it be said that you lead a boring life.”

“I wish. Anyway, now the Chantry wants me dead. Or something, it’s not like I stopped to ask for details.”

“Any experience living on the run?” He tried to tease, swallowing his own anger. Bitterness did not suit her.

“Apart from that year Loghain had a bounty on my head, you mean? None.”

They agreed to travel together, at least until such time their paths diverged. Coraline did not mind the company, even though said company was teetering between tears and anger. Anders looked like he had not known peace in years; his hair shaggy and unwashed, his cheeks hollow, his hands nervous. The five o’clock shadow she had found cheekily attractive back in Vigil’s Keep had turned into a scraggy unkept beard. His clothes were even worse than the rest of him; mud seemed to have fused with his leather boots, and Coraline was sure his tunic shirt was not meant to be rust-coloured. His coat seemed to have been beautiful once, with black feathered pauldrons, but it now hung pathetically on his too-thin frame.

She wondered if he had taken the cure she had sent him, if he had even received it. He must have; her messenger owl spell never failed.

He had been funny when she had met him years ago. Always a joke, always a flirt, a fragile veneer painted over old hurts. After learning that he had left Vigil’s Keep, she had hoped he would put his new-found freedom to good use. Helping apostates discreetly, taking out a few Templars here and there. When news of the Kirkwall Chantry’s collapse had reached her, she had sniggered at Alistair. ‘I told you so,’ she had mocked at the time. ‘Someone finally snapped.’ It had been a shock to learn that Anders had been responsible, and another one to learn that he had been killed during the following battle. Or, well, not killed, although the matter seemed up for discussion: the man looked like someone had scratched all the light out of him and left him an empty shell. Even his quips felt like he was going through the motions.

* * *

Already by the end of their first day of travel together, Anders was grateful for Amell’s presence. Having another person around meant having something else to focus on than his half-formed thoughts and the ideas that he could not quite grasp any more.

She was easygoing, animatedly telling him all about the King of Ferelden’s problems with angry dwarven merchants and the absurd story of the pillow smuggling ring operating in the Frosback Mountains. It was an appreciated change from her days as his Commander, when she had been more, well, commanding.

They set camp in the shelter of some large oak tree. The sky was clear enough that they had no reason to fear rain and the air mild enough that cold would not be a problem. Coraline made stew with the rabbit she had caught and the wild herbs and potatoes Anders had found.

“Is that the scarf I gave you?” She asked as they ate. Anders had to admit she was a more than decent cook, and the rabbit stew she had prepared tasted good enough that he would later scrape the bottom of the pot for some more. Probably those spices she used. He hummed a positive answer, his mouth too full to answer. “You’ve done a number on it.”

It wasn’t a reproach per say, but Anders still flushed at her words, his hands going to the tattered scarf. It had the roughness of old cloth now, the wool thinner in some places, speckled with his own blood from that day in Kirkwall. She held out an impatient hand and he gave her the scarf with hesitant fingers. Maybe she was angry at his treatment of it, maybe she wanted it back. He would have protested, but he could not muster the energy to argue.

But she put her bowl of stew down next to her and wove magic into the scarf. Anders stopped eating to watch her work. The hole closed as she sent swirls of magic through it, the wool fluffed under her touch. She handed it back to him without ceremony. “There, like new. Well, sort of.” Magic was powerless against blood stains.

His heart in his throat, Anders took the scarf, thanking her breathlessly. How could he have assumed she- he was such a wretch. She picked up her bowl and resumed eating casually, not paying him much attention.

“I took your cure,” he told her between bites, words spilling out before he could stop himself.

“… Good?”

“I didn’t think it would work.” The confession did not surprise her in the least, but saddened her none the less for it. The man looked half-dead already.

“I’m glad it did.”

He was silent for a moment, twirling his spoon in his bowl. “I merged with Justice, you know.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“You remember Justice? The spirit we found in Blackmarsh? I offered myself as a host when Kristoff’s body started to deteriorate too much. He died saving me after-” Anders’ voice hitched, the words stuck in his throat like bile. Coraline’s eyebrows went up to her hairline.

“What?”

“Justice.” Anders could not get any other word out, his throat closing up with unshed tears. Why had he thought bringing this up would be a good idea? His newly repaired scarf provided an answer, warm against his neck.

Coraline tried not to scream. What was it with people and spirits these days? As if the world was not exhausting enough. Why couldn’t people _not_ do things that required her to pick up the pieces afterwards? She was about to scold him for being so impossibly irresponsible, never mind that he had a decade of experience on her and that she was being _very very_ hypocritical, when she noticed again the way he hung his head, and the dark circles under his eyes, and the tattered cape he was wearing. Her anger melted like snow in summer. “How did it go?”

“Not well. When we merged, I thought we would be two entities sharing a body. What happened is that we… melded -badly- into a new person. My anger… corrupted him, in a way. After the Chantry, when Hawke -Anders could not get the words out-, Justice split from me. I’m not sure how it happened, but I think he died saving me. So I took your cure, hoping-” Anders shook his head, studying his hands intently. “Well. I’m here.”

She let out a breath she had not realized she had been holding. “Maker. It’s a miracle you’re alive.”

He gazed up at her and saw no judgement in her eyes. Miracle was hardly the word he would have used himself. Amell dug into her pack and handed him a cookie. “I was keeping it for a rainy day, but you clearly deserve it more than I do,” she told him with a shrug. As he nibbled on the sweet, disconcerted by her behaviour, Amell narrated for him the story of Wynne and her spirit friend. She spoke softly, and the peaceful way she told her tale helped more than the snack.

“She was my teacher in Kinloch. Part of the Aequitarians,” he told her when she finished. A few years earlier, he would have found it the pinnacle of comedy that Wynne, devout Andrastian, shining jewel of Kinloch Hold, had given in to possession. Now, he could barely muster a smile at the thought.

“She’s turned Loyalist lately. Always repeating the Chantry line. Magic is meant to serve men, with great power comes great responsibility... Made me want to throttle her half the time back then and it’s only gotten worse since.”

“Maybe the influence of the spirit of Faith?”

“No, I think it’s just… her. She believes that were the Circles to dissolve, Southern Thedas would become the new Tevinter.”

Anders all but spat on the ground. “Let me guess, she went back to Kinloch after the Blight.”

“Oh, no. She was made Archmage, so she can travel quite a bit. For politics, you see. She thinks she’s earned her freedom through faithful service to the Chantry.” Anders felt Amell’s voice chill quite significantly.

“Freedom should never have to be earned.” He shook his head earnestly, prompting her to raise an amused eyebrow at him.

“Wynne spent decades in the Circle being told otherwise. The older mages are scared of the outside, I think. After a while inside, they forget what it’s like and… Well, the world _is_ terrifying. I remember _I_ was terrified when I left -the rain, the sounds, the wind. And I wasn’t even twenty.”

“You, scared?”

“I was taken to the Circle when I was four,” she admitted. He knew that tone. It was the one he used when he was trying to make something important seem mundane. He had known that she had been taken young; he remembered the Tranquil cutting her food at mealtimes. But it only dawned on him now how much younger than him she had been. She continued lightly. Too lightly. “I didn’t remember anything about the outside. You should have seen me the first time I saw a cow. Thought it was going to kill me.”

It took all his willpower to make a joke instead of asking; she so clearly did not wish him to. “Well, cows are terrifying. It’s the horns.”

“I didn’t realize they’d be this big! I thought they’d be, I don’t know, mabari-sized. And the sounds! There were just… So many of them.”

They listened in silence a few seconds. In the distance, a wolf howled, soon answered by his brethren. “See?” She said, before yawning uncontrollably. They had talked far too long into the night already and would pay for it the next day on the road.

He got up, grabbing his staff. “I’ll go set some more wards for the night. Just in case of wolves.”


	3. The Clouds Burst

To cross Antiva from South to North, one needed to cross the Tresa river, which took its source in the Tellari swamps and flew into the Rialto Bay in Antiva City. Of course, one could decide to bypass crossing the river entirely and take one’s chances through the swamps in the West, but Coraline knew the legends and the only way she would ever set foot in that place was at the point of a sword. Instead, they regained the main road to Seleny to cross on the bridge. She was not worried; this trade route was rarely used, most merchants and smugglers using boats instead to carry goods to and from the Bay.

“Why didn’t you stay in Kirkwall?” she asked as they walked over the stone bridge, large enough for two carts to cross and high enough to accommodate barges underneath.

Anders did not answer and she thought he had not heard her. He was quite a few paces ahead of her, after all. She did not ask again, just in case he _had_ heard her and ignored her. Instead, she stopped a moment to remember Antiva City, lying far below in the East, a jewel of architecture. She could always catch up to him later. In her mind, the blue waters of the Rialto Bay glittered in the sunlight beyond the city. She wished she knew how to swim.

“I died, remember?” Anders’ voice made her jump. She had not expected him to wait, even less come back. She turned around -he was looking over the river, as she had done before. The slow wind made his thin cape twirl around his thighs. “It was mayhem,” he continued. “I don’t think anyone looked for my body. If anyone did, they probably assumed someone found it before them. Most mages took to the Vimmark Mountains after the Templar reinforcements arrived to support Cullen’s troops. Some have crossed into Ferelden.”

“That’s not what I was asking.”

“I was- broken.” He stopped, walls going up, old instincts kicking in. But this was Amell and he had Justice’s memories of her enmeshed with his own. Shining, bright, wise. And she had fixed his scarf. He pushed through. “I felt Hawke’s blade cut me through. Justice took over to save my life, I think. I was- It was a mess. I didn’t know where to go.” Silence passed between them, troubled only by the sound of the river.

“You tried. That matters, you know.”

“I didn’t know what else to do. More mages were being made Tranquil everyday. Abused, raped, killed, pushed to suicide… The Knight Commander had sent for an annulment. I knew the Divine would believe every lie, the blood magic, the abominations... I tried, you know.” Now that he was talking, words were pouring out of him like a confession. “No one would listen. I wrote a manifesto that no one read, I argued with the Grand Cleric and the Templars, I tried to show that mages were good, over and over again. Justice demanded that I act, but I insisted I could make them see. Make them understand. I thought I could change the world peacefully.” He shook his head ruefully, a dark laughter taking him. Beside him, Amell was listening silently, looking over the river. Maybe her way to give him some privacy as his heart spilled out of his chest. “For six years, I tried. The repression got worse, the Seekers did nothing when they came to Kirkwall, the Grand Cleric was idle in the face of abuse. I didn’t know what else to do.”

She glanced at him, her dark green eyes inscrutable. “You did the right thing. Without you starting the uprising, every mage in that city would have died without a chance to fight.”

There was silence for a few moments as Anders seemed to process her words. She waited patiently. “You actually agree. I thought you were joking.”

She cocked her head to the side, a half smile on her face. “Oh. Is that a problem?”

“I- I simply did not expect… You’re-” he stammered out as if struck dumb.

“Deep breaths, Anders,” she ordered, no longer smiling and looking quite concerned for him. He obeyed.

“I killed a lot of people,” he managed to say.

When Amell next spoke, her voice had a slight edge to it. “So did the Templars. Was the explosion solely Justice’s doing?” In her eyes shone a glint of something; maybe it was amusement, maybe it was simple curiosity. Anders took the question as a challenge and when he spoke, his voice did not waver.

“No. Justice spurred me on, but we were in agreement. I am responsible for my actions.” The admission was freeing, in a way. He looked down at her, head raised with the confidence that so often accompanies truth.

Amell’s smile grew. “Good,” she said, and Anders realized he knew very little of who Amell was. She talked a lot, but never really said much. He would never have expected her to condone his actions, yet, here she was, smiling at his confession. Come to think of it, he did not know if she was even Andrastian. Somehow, he was sure that Justice would had known the answer to that.

They were both silent for a while, watching the waters underneath them flow lazily towards the Bay. Then, a light went up in Coraline’s head and her heart froze. “Wait, Cullen?”

“Curly haired, slightly homicidal. He was in Kinloch when we were.”

“Oh, I remember him,” she said, unable to keep the bitterness out of her voice. Cullen had haunted Neria’s steps for a year like a lovesick puppy with a big sword and authority to do to her whatever he wished. She should have killed him during Uldred’s rebellion. “Let’s keep moving,” she added abruptly.

His elation gone, Anders worried. He had seen the way Coraline’s hand had tightened on her staff at the mention of Cullen, the way her shoulders had squared and her jaw clenched. She was not as subtle as she thought she was. He tried not to ask. In fact, he spent his morning concentrating on _not _asking, not even picking the wild rosemary sprinkled along their way. He almost let out a sigh of relief when she asked first.

“How the fuck did that creep manage to be in charge? Of anything?” Her voice was loud and incredulous. She had clearly spent her morning ruminating on Cullen’s annoying face too.

“He was the Knight-Captain in Kirkwall when I got there. Got promoted to Knight-Commander a few months ago after Meredith decided to kill everyone.”

“Why would anyone put that guy in charge of _anything_?"

“The Chantry’s never been known for their decision-making. I won’t complain, really, I prefer my Templars stupid. He made it easier to break mages out of the Gallows, too. He was always looking in the wrong places.”

“Still, I can’t believe… That little fucker.” She shook her head.

“You know him?” Anders slapped himself mentally as soon as he got the words out. That was obviously none of his business.

“He was at my Harrowing.” That was all that needed to be said. “I freed him from Uldred’s spell during the rebellion. He wanted to call for the rite.”

“That’s… not surprising at all.”

She kept grumbling under her breath for a long time after as they walked the rocky paths in the hilly countryside under a quickly darkening sky.

* * *

Ever since Justice left -died-, Anders had trouble thinking. Beyond the guilt, beyond the anger and the grief, there was an unmistakable sense of wrongness. There were missing feelings and unfinished thoughts like his mind did not quite fit him anymore. It stopped him from feeling clearly, from making sense from within. A sort of queasiness of the mind, materializing in his tight throat, his aching chest, his tense shoulders. At his side, oblivious to his distress, Amell was holding a shield spell above their heads to protect them from the pouring rain.

The wrongness kept coming, the world saturated with it. When Amell cast a spell, no music played in the air. When the raindrops fell, there was no child-like wonder at the back of his mind. When thoughts of the Circle invaded his head, the voice telling him that he was not at fault was silent. When he thought of the freedom he had fought for, the hope and righteousness that once had tugged at his heart were no more.

He was drained. Incomplete. Wrong.

He wanted to cry, he realized as he tripped in yet another puddle. He wanted to lay down under a tree, curl up into a ball and cry. The rain was so torrential that even Amell’s spell could not stop the ambient moisture from seeping into his bones, his robes were drenched in mud, his feet soaking wet, he was sure he was getting a cold, and everything was bad and wrong and he wanted the world to just stop. He tried breathing deeply and thinking happy thoughts, but his eyes welled up with angry, tired tears anyway.

Amell swore loudly and disappeared from his field of vision as her spell failed and cold curtains of rain spilled on him. The sudden shower shocked him out of his ruminations and he looked down on his companion, who was sitting dejectedly in the giant mud puddle she had just slipped in. She glanced up at him and made a non-committal gesture with her hands, a sort of ‘whatever, I give up’.

He helped her back up, feeling just a little better, because he, a least, did not have mud in his hair. The feeling did not last long, however, as he could already feel cold raindrops trickling down his neck. They were going to catch their death in this weather, no matter how talented at healing he was.

“We need to get out of the rain,” he yelled to her even though they were side by side. The downpour was deafening.

She shot him an eloquent look. “No kidding.”

She grabbed his arm and pulled him into the thick forest, outside the path. They progressed a few minutes in silence -talking was harder when you were fighting against spiky bramble with mud to your calves. With the invaluable help of their staves, they hacked their way down a small hill, Amell leading the way. Anders had no idea where they were going, but Amell seemed to know and soon enough, they did in fact arrive at a boarded-up mine entrance.

Which Amell promptly blew up, energy surging from her hands. She was not subtle, but Anders had to admit she was effective. Her plan to get out of the rain was good, except for one small, tiny, insignificant flaw: it was a mine. Anders did not like mines, or caves, or Deep Roads, or anything that had to do with being somewhere dark and underground for any length of time.

Under the pouring rain, he squinted to see Amell turn back to him, an apologetic look on her face and shout, “Best I can do!”

Anders braced himself and stepped forward, stopping just after he passed the entrance. Amell had dragged him into the Deep Roads once and he had sworn to himself he would never follow her anywhere underground ever again, nightmares about the Children still visiting him from time to time. Luckily, she did not go much further in, stopping maybe four feet inside the tunnel, where the dim outside light barely reached.

“We’re not going further. I’ve no idea what’s down there,” she explained as the dropped her bag, unfastened her cape and slumped on the ground, still covered in mud. Coming from the woman who had once decided to explore the Blackmarsh for shits and giggles, this was a terrifying statement.

On Anders’ left, the heavens seemed intent on drowning the world. On his right, ominous darkness. He sat down gingerly and tried to wrench the water out of his coat. A small puddle formed underneath him.

Amell continued, imperturbable. “This is an old coal mine, collapsed a while back. But they say the Deep Roads go all over, so I’m not taking any chances that, you know...”

“A merry band of darkspawn decided to leave home and explore the world?”

“...Something like that.” She barely smiled. “We’ll wait out the rain here. I refuse to go back out.” She seemed so mightily pissed off, frowning at the rain and jutting her chin out decidedly, as if she took the weather as a personal affront, that Anders could not help but feel a little better about the situation.

“How vulnerable are we to the Taint, exactly?”

“Very. A simple touch is enough to kill you -in a matter of minutes. I never got to test it, but I suspect close proximity with a powerful darkspawn like the Emissary would be enough to contract it.”

“This day keeps getting better,” he dead-panned.

They stacked the mine with an impressive array of protection spells, from classic shields to explosive enchantments, should anyone attack from the inside. Anders’ shields were stronger, more finely woven than Amell’s, but she added a number of unsavoury spells that would at least badly maim anyone trying to go through them. The thought of anything coming out of the darkness made Anders shudder and he tried really hard not to think about what could be lying in wait in the shadows. He went to sit as close to the entrance -to the light- as he could without getting wetter. It was not like they had a lot of space anyway; he could barely lay down between the rain and the shields.

Seemingly unfazed by the encroaching darkness, Amell worked on ridding the ground of moisture (magically), lighting the planks that had served to board up the entrance on fire for warmth and light (magically), drying most of her clothes (magically) and digging a little trench at the entrance so that the rain would not trickle down too much in their makeshift camp. Anders watched her, knowing he should help and yet not finding the energy to. She knew a remarkable array of utility spells. None of this knowledge was Circle-approved, the Chantry preferring its mages incapable of surviving out in the wild.

Thankfully, she did not comment on his apathy, focusing instead of making dinner on the campfire. It was just at the entrance, and because the tunnel went down, the smoke did not back up into it. She seemed content enough to ignore him, leaving Anders to think at leisure about himself.

He wondered where to go. He considered staying here forever, stuck between the relentless rain and the sinister shadows. A fitting end, he thought grimly before going back to more realistic ideas.

The Free Marches were off-limits; Sebastian wanted his head. As for the Anderfels, though it had been his namesake for decades, it was ruled conjointly by the Chantry and the Grey Wardens, two organizations he should try to steer clear from. There was always Tevinter. Ten years ago, he would gladly have crossed their borders; now, burdened with the memories of Fenris’ tales, he had no intention of visiting the place, no matter how much the elf might have exaggerated.

Ferelden had been his home, but Kinloch Hold loomed upon his memories. Perhaps Orlais was a good idea, after all. The irony of the apostate who destroyed a Chantry living in the Chantry’s true seat of power was almost too good to pass up. Almost.

Truth was, he had no idea where to go. He could stop in a village around, help out the people there. How long until the Templars found him? Even if Anders was dead to the world, he was still an apostate. They would look eventually. They always did.

He wished Justice was with him. Justice had always known what to do. Before the Chantry, neither of them had expected to survive the fallout, but when Hawke had let them go, they had started making plans for a revolution. He had thought about tactics, about camps hidden in the wilderness, about schools for the children… All that was gone now, leaving only exhaustion. Anders pushed the sadness back inside, quieted his howling heart, and turned his attention to lighter matters.

He watched Amell heat up a small pot and boil some root vegetables into a stew, adding strips of salted pork at the end. She kept feeding him and he could only wonder how much of a strain of her resources he was. He had left Kirkwall in a panicked rush, taking only the bare essentials, and his supply of food had been reduced to a small sack of oats he kept the Ferelden way, in a small pouch around his neck. She handed him a bowl of stew along with some of her bread. As usual, he considered refusing, but as usual, it smelled just good enough that he could not.

“We’ll be in Seleny in two days,” she told him as they ate. “Getting to the frontier through the Drylands should take less than a week after that.” He nodded carefully but said nothing. “I’ll travel along the coastline after -it’s longer but I want to avoid getting lost in the forests. Templars don’t really have any authority outside of Dairsmuid so they won’t be a problem.” Still, Anders waited for her to get to the point. After a moment of hesitation, she did. “Where are you going exactly?”

“Seheron, obviously. Nobody in their right mind would want to go there, so it’s the perfect place to go.” She smirked at his shaky logic.

“You could go back south to Denerim, you know.”

“A trade centre? Where merchants from Kirkwall might recognize me? I don’t think so.” With ships coming in from the Free Marches regularly, it would only be a matter of time before a sailor recognized his face. He had healed enough of their rashes in Kirkwall.

“Alistair’s already stood his troops down. No mage fleeing Kirkwall is be captured by Fereldan soldiers. Your only problem would be the Templars, and I’m sure Alistair would hide you if you asked,” she continued stubbornly. She looked so convinced of what she was saying that Anders had to hold back a dry laugh at her naivete.

“Why would the King of Ferelden-”

“Because I’d ask him. And because he’d love the opportunity to stick it to the Divine.” She rolled her eyes, smiling nonetheless. “I won’t pretend he’s thrilled that you blew up a Chantry, but he… gets it, in a way.”

“I'm not sure what to say... I don’t think I can cross the Free Marches again. The place is crawling with Templars.”

“That’s fair. But seriously, where are you going? You can’t keep walking forever.”

“I-”

She did not leave him time to come up with an excuse. “You could come to Rivain. It’s hot and it’s even more rainy than here in the summer-” Anders looked outside pointedly. She smirked. “I’m barely exaggerating, trust me- and there’s always a few Qunari spies around, but at least there’s no Chantry outside of Dairsmuid.”

“I suppose that would be a step up from Kirkwall.”

“Anders, the Deep Roads would be a step up from Kirkwall. Besides, I know a few mages who’d be interested in your spirit healing. That is, if you’re interested in teaching.”

“I’m not going to a Circle!”

She snorted, delighted. “I wasn’t talking of people in the Circles. Speaking of, there shouldn’t be any Templars in Seleny. They’re probably closing ranks around the Circles, and they have no reason to look for either of us there. I’ve got people running the rumour that I’m in Orlais and everyone thinks you’re dead.”

“I wonder how my funeral went,” he jested half-heartedly, knowing there had not been one. “What do you think is happening in the Circles?” He asked, Amell’s talk of Templars reminding him that she probably knew more about the political mood than him. He had been in solitary hiding for months.

“Right now? Nothing. The College of Enchanters voted to keep the Circles a few weeks ago.”

There was only the crackling of the fire for a moment, and then Anders exploded. “Andraste’s flaming arse! Are you serious? Don’t they realize-” Anders’ swears got lost in incoherent huffs and Amell waited for him to calm down a little. His hands were trembling with indignation.

“I know. I had hoped they would vote for dissolution too, but Wynne convinced them not to, told them to be patient.” Anders felt the grimace she made deep in his soul.

“Patient? I blew up a Chantry! Are you telling me that it was for nothing? That nothing changed?”

“A lot of mages from the Gallows got out thanks to that. If you hadn’t, they’d all be either dead or Tranquil right now.”

“But- It was supposed to spark something! To finally spur the mages into action, to-”

Amell sighed, unmoved by his erratic gestures. “I get what you were trying to do, I really do. But as long as the Rite of Tranquility hangs over our heads, the College will be overly cautious. I know Ansburg and Starkhaven have revolted. Nevarra and Cumberland too. The Templars still control the situation, though.” Anders retreated in on himself, anger leaving place to a mixture of shame and sadness. He did not deserve her patience. She shrugged. “What you’ve done is heat up an already boiling pot. It’s got to explode eventually -there’s just no way around it. Between the Templar crackdowns, the increasing harsh stances of the Chantry… You’ve proven that the Templars are willing to annul a whole Circle over the actions of one apostate. The vote to stay was very close, it might go the other way next time.”

Anders let out a bitter bark of a laugh. “If the massacre in Kirkwall didn’t convince them, nothing ever will.”

“They’ve elected Fiona as Grand Enchanter. It’s proof that things are moving. Void, even the fact that there was a vote is progress. It would never have happened under Briaus.”

“The Aequitarians are still allied with the Loyalists, aren’t they? They’ll never go over to the Libertarians,” Anders pointed out.

“Fiona is popular with some of them, but she is on shaky ground with the Chantry and the Enchanters are cautious. I don’t know what it’s going to take to blow up the gaatlok keg, but something’s bound to happen. If Wynne can’t influence the next vote, there will be a revolution.”

Anders had to admit she was right, about everything. He had never thought the Warden-Commander had any awareness of Circle politics before -she had always avoided the subject in Amaranthine. He liked it, watching her weigh her words carefully as she explained to him things he already knew.

“If only you’d gotten to Kinloch a day late during Uldred’s rebellion,” he said a little viciously, instantly regretting it. She shook her head mirthlessly.

“Wynne was instrumental in stopping the Blight, whatever she is doing now. Spirit healers are a gift to the rest of us.”

Anders almost flirted with her, out of habit and because he already had three funny responses on the tip of his tongue. The tiredness suffusing his bones made him swallow his words.

“I didn’t realize you were interested in politics.”, he said instead. “You never gave the impression back in the Keep.”

She sniggered. “You said the Libertarians were making things worse and I didn’t have the time to argue. But I am so fucking proud of you now.”

“Oh.”

Her smile was defiant. “You tried! You did something. Even if the College doesn’t take this chance, you’ve given it to them. That matters.”

Anders was struck dumb, again, but she did not seem to notice. Apart from Justice, no one had ever sat in front of him and told him he was good. Not since Karl. And here was his Warden-Commander, Hero of the Fifth Blight, telling him once again in no uncertain terms that he had been right. ‘You did the right thing’, she had told him a few days earlier, and now this.

He held back the sob that was strangling him. “Thank you,” he said finally, although this seemed insufficient. “For what it’s worth, I was… more selfish back then. Justice helped with that,” he added a little lamely.

She lost her smile at the mention of the spirit, but quickly regained it and changed the topic to local traditions. Her stories, Anders had found, made for great distractions. The unease did not leave him entirely, but as long as he listened to ludicrous tales of pirates and assassins, he could ignore it.

* * *

Coraline had always had trouble falling asleep and it had only gotten worse through the years. But now, because of the cure and what it had taken to create it, she dreaded the things that came with entering the realm of dreams.

She did not consider sleep evading her such an unwanted thing -of course, it tired her beyond words, but she had no heart for her demon’s games. She needed to get to Ayesleigh, to that manuscript, and find a way out of the mess she had created, the sooner the better. She laid motionless on the cold dirt, an eye on the shields, an ear on the thunderous rain. She had complete confidence in hers and Anders’ spellwork, but it did not stop her from shivering with more than cold every time a gust of wind came from inside in the mine.

She let mind race aimlessly, playing with ice, creating a thin sheet over her hand and then melting it in a slow rhythm. The repeat of the spell sequence acted as a sort of meditation, relaxing her as she went. As her breathing started to fall in sync with the spell, a cry startled her and she scrambled for her staff, ready to freeze whatever had interrupted her musings. A couple of feet from her, pressed against the opposite tunnel wall, Anders was trashing in his sleep. She sighed, relieved at the evident lack of demon/abomination/bandits, and put her staff down. He cried out again, in pain or in fear, and she hesitated. It was hardly her place to intervene, after all.

She went to wake him anyway.

He jolted awake at her touch, his staff already in his hands. Pearls of sweat covered his forehead and he looked around wildly.

“You had a nightmare,” she told him as gently as she could. Slowly, his grip on his staff softened and his face seemed to colour again. Her presence seemed to confuse him greatly.

“Right. Yes.” Now that he remembered where he was, he bowed his head shamefully.

“It’s alright, it happens.” She squeezed his shoulder lightly before letting go. “It’s almost morning, try to go back to sleep.”

She laid back on her cape and listened as his breath slowed down in the quiet of the night. Maybe it was lonely in Anders’ head without Justice. She let the night pass her by, falling asleep at sunrise.


	4. Farewell to Justice

“Hello, mage,” the demon greeted. At least it was always polite, she had to give it that.

She inclined her head in greeting. “Hello, Gax. Is there a particular reason to your visit?”

She knew the way she shortened its name, a mark of disrespect, infuriated the demon. As usual, he was careful not to let it show and floated around, glancing leisurely at the shields it had just obliterated to get in Coraline’s Fade space. “Visiting a new friend, nothing more.”

“How very kind.”

“And a reminder, of course. Midsummer’s eve.”

Coraline nodded. “Midsummer’s eve.”

“Don’t look so sour. A favour for a favour, it is the way.”

“As I am aware. You need not worry; my part of the contract will be fulfilled in due time.”

“If it is not, you know the price.”

Gaxkang showed no intention of leaving; Coraline figured that, even though conversations with it were exhausting, at least her body was getting some rest.

“A fascinating travel companion you have,” it said, too nonchalant to be honest.

She kept cool, already searching to manoeuvrer the demon away from its new interest. “A temporary arrangement. He will be no hindrance.”

“Merging with a spirit once… I wonder, would he do it again?”

Her eyes opened wide. “Wait, what?” She lowered her voice. “He’s an abomination?” Really, her talents were wasted as a mage; she should have become an actress instead. The lie had come instinctively, her subconscious having long decided feigning ignorance was usually a wise strategy.

Gaxkang chuckled, maybe buying into her lie, maybe not. She never quite could tell. “There are worse things. And Justice, no less. He still reeks of it.”

She seemed to think about it, an unfocused stare coming in handy. “I can’t believe this.”

“I do not lie,” Gaxkang said.

Forced was she to admit it was not, at least in this case. In fact, it had never lied to her, at least not outright. She snorted. That was probably its only redeeming feature.

“He is clear of the spirit, if that bothers you”, Gaxkang said, still floating around. “Although you should get comfortable with the idea of possession. You owe me a body, after all.”

“Yes, yes. Midsummer’s eve, Gax.”

The demon nodded, a hint of irritation shining through. “Midsummer’s eve,” it repeated, before saluting and leaving her to repair her wards.

Unfortunately for Coraline, sealing a deal with a demon granted them a power over you in the Fade -a subtle power, yet a very real one. The main downside was Gaxkang’s ability to bypass all and any of her shields with barely any effort. More than a dangerous inconvenience, she found it insulting. She put work into these!

The Pride Demon had shown no real interest in trying to possess Anders, which Coraline found somewhat suspicious. The mage was powerful, relatively young and healthy, and had a strong connection to the Fade, courtesy of his Spirit Healer training. She had feared, at first, that the Demon would demand she give him to it. But then again, with what she had promised the demon, it had little need to go around trying to possess a random human.

Maybe it was simply trying to encourage her to leave Anders behind. It was a plausible theory; Anders’ wards were extremely strong, and it was possible that they interfered with its comings and goings around her.

Or maybe it had simply seen an opportunity to tick her off, which would be very in-character. A Desire demon would be more careful in its interactions, but Gaxkang was Pride, and Pride could never resist a chance to show off.

Still, she wondered. That it had even noticed something off about Anders was troubling. Evidently, a human could see there was something off about Anders from a mile away, but demons had difficulty reading subtler emotions, and were less likely to link wearing dirty, tattered clothes or forgoing bathing to one’s mental health.

That meant whatever was off about Anders was, in addition to the general state of him, magical in nature. This in turn suggested Justice, considering Gaxkang had even succeeded in correctly identifying the nature of the spirit. Was it possible a part of him still lingered within Anders? That some remnant of his being, somewhere, still existed?

Or maybe she was just imagining things, and Gaxkang’s long list of possession victims simply meant he was more experienced in human customs and emotions than she had surmised.

The thought of Justice’s survival lifted her spirits, at least, lowered quite drastically since the Demon had referred to their deal’s deadline.

Deadline. How very appropriate a word, she thought, and then she woke up.

* * *

The rain had stopped during the night, and they got back on the road with dry clothes and tired eyes. “Are you sure Justice died?” Coraline asked as they walked, stifling a yawn.

She would have been more subtle about it, should have been more subtle about it, but drowsiness coupled with hope made her a little too impatient.

“Yes. The amount of power it took to wrench himself from me, and then to heal me.. There is no way he could have survived.”

“You know, Avaar mages take spirits unto themselves, as part of their traditions. They learn most of their magic through the teachings of spirits. And the Rivaini seers too. The spirits aren’t harmed when they leave, though the rituals to achieve that are… taxing.”

“They do? I thought it was just superstition...” Anders stayed silent for a moment. “Whatever their mages do, it wasn’t like that with Justice.” Coraline would argue, but Anders seemed reluctant and there was little point anyway, seeing as she had no way of proving him wrong -if he even was.

And unlike her, Anders had experience with Justice on top of experience with the Fade in general. There was no reason the spirit healer was wrong about this.

Unfortunately, this would also mean that her assumptions about Gaxkang were wrong. The Demon had tricked her before, and it was powerful -not to mention very old. Or maybe it had simply found an imprint of a memory left by Justice in the Face and come to accurate conclusions. She focused her attention back on the conversation at hand.

“I’m sorry,” she said, for lack of better words. Justice had been her friend, too. She had relished in the spirit’s confidence in its own purpose, refreshed to see someone so quietly sure of who or what they were. She remembered Justice speaking through Kristoff’s lips, trying to understand this world, maybe longing to experience more of it.

If only she had stayed in Vigil’s Keep. If only she had kept an eye on the both of them, like she should have done.

“He liked you.” Anders’ voice was wistful. “You helped him. He thought you sang beautifully.”

“You’ve never hear me sing.” Her singing had once been described as ‘midway between a squealing pig and a dying shriek’ by Zevran and even Leliana had given up on trying to give her singing lessons, but she was not about to tell Anders that.

“No, I mean- Your magic sang. For spirits, everything has a song. Yours was...” She watched him as he trailed off, his brow creased as he called back a memory of a memory. “… good,” he finished lamely.

“I remember Justice saying something about that. Being able to feel memories.”

She remembered their conversations by firelight, in her cold, stony office in Vigil’s Keep. The two armchairs upholstered in red velvet, her only luxury, they had sat on in front of the fireplace, and Justice’s comments on the Waking World. She had encouraged his curiosity, at the time, tried to help him understand these new feelings he was so unfamiliar with. She wondered if she had made the right choice, if instead, she should have been trying to help him get back home.

“Yes, impressions left through time in the Fade,” Anders said.

“I wonder how much of him is still left in you,” she mused aloud. After all, living with someone for so long was bound to leave traces; to give him another point of view on the world around.

“There is nothing left. He’s gone.” Anders’ voice shook through the words.

She shook her head softly. “I didn’t mean that. Our experiences shape who we are. Your understanding of the world must be different now, because of him.”

“That’s… surprisingly insightful.” His voice contained a hint of humour and a lot more incredulity. She sniffed at him.

“I’ve been known to do that from time to time,” she dead-panned. He rewarded the jab with a shallow smile, losing it as soon as it appeared.

“It feels purposeless, without Justice. I knew my cause was righteous, and Justice spurred me on. Now, my thoughts keep wandering away, and I can’t- I can’t focus. Not like I did when I was both of us.”

“Having doubts and wandering thoughts is normal. Well, for a human, at least.”

“I know, I still have memories from when I was Anders before. It’s not like that. It's… well, Justice's thoughts are missing.”

“I can’t imagine what that’s like.” She refrained from speculating out loud, but she thought maybe it was a little like being Tranquil. She did not think telling Anders that would be very productive, somehow.

“It’s like... Bathing in light, and then being locked in a cavern, with only shadows on the wall. Justice knew that Justice meant, and so did I. Everything’s muddled now.”

“You miss the certainty." It made sense; Justice was purposeful, sure of its goal and steadfast in its pursuit. Maybe that was what people felt when they had a crisis of faith. She had no idea how to fix it. The thought that she would even want to in the first place did not surprise her -she had made a habit out of picking up other people's pieces, after all. And Anders, who she had recruited in her ranks once, still felt like her responsibility.

“Yes, I suppose I do. Being Justice was… freeing, I guess.”

“I don’t know how you did it, the merging. That was very brave of you.” He waved her words away sadly, already deep in thought again.

They walked side by side in silence for a while, dirt paths between barren fields. The air was still cold, but the sun was shining overhead.

“We should have a funeral,” Coraline announced suddenly. Anders tripped on air at her words. “Unless you already had one, I mean.”

“No, I have not. I’m not even sure how...” The words had difficulty coming through his constricted throat and made Anders want to scream. He found himself wanting to go home. Really, very much, go home, like the helpless, terrified twelve-years-old he had once been. And like that child, he had no home to get back to -no covers to hide under, no pillow to curl up against, no cookie jar to dig into when the world lacked sweetness. Amell continued. “We could build a pyre. Poetry reading instead of the Chant, maybe?”

“It would need to be somewhere nice.” They looked around. The path they walked snaked through a large plain, surrounded by long-tilled earth. “Somewhere he’d like.”

“Alright. We’ll keep walking and if you find a good place, you tell me.”

“Thanks, Amell.”

She turned around. “I’m not your commanding officer anymore. You can call me Cora like everyone else.”

“Cora it is.” If she had not been thinking of Justice, she might just have blushed at the crinkle around his eyes.

* * *

Anders found a suitable place as their shadows grew longer under them. Coraline could not tell, but he said the Veil was thin there. Unlike her who had focused on a more practical approach to her magic, he was sensitive to those things, courtesy of his spirit healer training. Maybe cohabiting with Justice had also attuned his senses to the movements of the Fade.

The place was secluded, a little off the forest path they had been travelling on. It was a small glade, hidden from prying eyes by some tall grass. A wild winter honeysuckle bush was flowering underneath an ancient oak tree, wild laurier-tin surrounded them. The cold evening light streamed through the nude branches, shimmering on the dewy grass.

Coraline looked to Anders, but he seemed unfocused on the present moment. She laid down her travel pack and arranged the few flowers she had collected in a small bouquet. Her skills in wreath-making were inexistent, so the flowers would simply be laid down on the pyre. She doubted Justice would mind.

Anders gathered a bundle of wood, and she help him lay it in a pyre in the middle of the glade, surrounding it with rocks. It was far too small to burn a body on, but they had no body to burn. Anders laid some written pages on it and Coraline her flowers.

The flowers did not seem enough. Justice deserved more than fleeting beauty, especially when she could give him a song. Anders’ earlier words came back to her, and on an impulse, she lowered her staff and split it in two cleanly with a spell. It had been a gift from Bhelen the King of Orzammar, and lyrium flowed inside the silverite. Justice had once been entranced by the music of lyrium, wishing every spirit in the Fade could hear it like he did it the Waking world. Carefully, she poured the lyrium of her staff on the pyre until it was empty.

Anders was looking at her solemnly when she went back to his side. “He liked the music, did he not?” She tried to explain. His eyes shone, fixed on the blue liquid on the pyre.

“He did.”

He insisted that she lit up the fire on her own; she wanted to argue, but the man seemed ready to shatter, so she obeyed silently. She lit up the funeral pyre and they watched it burn a blue fire, stained by the lyrium.

Anders mourned silently and so did Coraline, feeling like Justice deserved more than the crackling of fire. She tried, a little embarrassed to know someone was watching, even though that someone had shared a brain-space with Justice for over five years.

“I’m sorry,” she said in a whisper. “I’ll miss you.” Anything else she wanted to say, she thought very loudly instead. I'm sorry I did not help you go home. I'm sorry you died. I'm sorry the world is the way it is. I'm sorry I did not do more. I hope you like the music. When she had no more thoughts to think, she put a tentative hand on Anders’ shoulder. Even with his shoulders lowered, he was still a lot taller than her. Then, she left the glade with heavy feet, leaving Anders to make his goodbyes in private.

She waited on the path for him to come back, the night and the temperature slowly falling around her. Still, she decided to give him as much time as he needed. They would just have to make due after. She was just beginning to wonder if leaving him alone had been wise when he emerged from the bushes. They fell in step and she lit their way magically, not commenting on his red nose or his puffy eyes.

They kept walking long into the night. Sleeping close to a sepulture seemed disrespectful, troubling the rest of the dead. When finally they laid down to catch a couple of hours of sleep before dawn and Coraline heard Anders’ ragged breathing as he pretended to sleep, she did him the kindness of ignoring it.


	5. A Short Rest

“At least trim it or something,” Coraline insisted, handing Anders a knife he refused, stubborn as a mabari. “Come on,” she waggled her knife at his face. “It looks like a rat crawled up your chin and died on there.”

“I don’t want to,” the grown man whined. If Coraline had wanted to deal with annoying children, she would have stayed in Denerim. No, she amended her thoughts, that was not fair to Alistair. At least, he shaved.

“Well, you’re gonna have to, or I’ll paralyse you and deal with this -she gestured at his unclean beard- monstrosity myself.”

It took some more threatening, but Anders finally relented and trimmed his beard. Coraline did not herself care what he looked like, but they were in the outskirts of Seleny and the city guards were sure to be on edge if they saw Anders as he looked now, too bloodstained to be a beggar and too ragged to be a hired thug. The last thing she needed was the attention of soldiers.

He looked marginally better with his cleaner clothes (not clean, cleaner. Some stains simply never washed off.) and his shortened beard. Of course, nothing could erase the gauntness of his face or the derelict state of his coat. Coraline had to fight him into leaving said feather coat behind; the garment had lost half its plumage and rusty-coloured blood stained what was left of it. He sulked the rest of the morning as they made their way towards the town, dragging his feet like a chastised toddler.

They hid Anders’ staff in the outskirts of the city and Coraline put a tracking spell on it ‘just in case a thief passed this way’. People always had expectations for what a mage should look like. With pants and without a staff, it was easy to fool the world. They came through the main road, posing as Isolde and Tristan, two siblings on their way to visit an ailing grand-mother. It was not the best cover story, but at worse people would simply assume they were eloped lovers or escaped slaves from Tevinter. This was Antiva, after all, and Antivans loved nothing more than a romantic story.

Seleny itself was a small city, built upon the northern edge of the Tellari swamp, where witches and demons were known to roam. The remnants of a city wall bordered the town, long lost to the encroaching humidity. Outside the official town border, the poor quarter sprawled wherever there was space to fill. People there lived in hovels made of wooden planks, in stark contrast to the large beige sandstone buildings of the merchant and the noble districts. Most of these shacks balanced on low stilts, the swamp flooding their streets often enough to make it a necessity. There was no Alienage in Seleny, which meant there was instead an elven-only quarter, even if it was not walled-off. Even in Antiva where pirates, thieves and murderers had a rather lax interpretation of the Chant, humans did not much like the company of knife-ears.

Coraline and Anders crossed the marketplace to get to the Trade District and Coraline rejoiced to see the sight of so many shiny baubles and sweet-smelling deserts bring a smile back to Anders’ face.

They found a proper-looking enough inn to stay for the night, and Coraline had to explain that double bedrooms cost the same as single ones in Antiva (this was a lie) in order for Anders to finally relent and let her pay without arguing. The man was very silly, considering he had less coin than a common beggar. At least, the innkeeper found their antics amusing. The room was not as nice as those in the Noble Quarter, but the sheets were clean enough and there was even, providentially, a small bathtub. Any display of wealth beyond that of the general populace would only have gotten them robbed any way. It was a time-honoured Antivan custom.

Having put their feet down in the inn, they decided to stay there for lunch. Their waitress was a young girl, maybe eighteen, and she kept throwing glances in their direction while blushing and whispering with the other girls. Anders did not seem to notice, too busy trying -and failing- to peel his shrimps, but Coraline did and smiled at her reassuringly.

It emboldened the girl and she came to their table, shuffling her feet. “My friends and I,” she started with a blubber, “we were wondering about the -her voice lowered to a whisper- the explosion, you know, in Kirkwall. You said you came from Highever, right? Have you heard anything?” Anders almost strangled himself with his shrimp.

“They said an apostate did it,” Coraline answered in a matching conspiratorial tone. “They said it’s because the Grand Cleric was going to slaughter the whole city!” On the other side of the table, Anders gasped for air, royally ignored by the two women. Some of the other serving girls started to approach timidly and the merchants on the next table over were already lending an ear to the gossip.

“I heard the Templars killed everyone,” the serving girl said.

Another piped up. “I have a cousin there, she wrote it was like the sky was on fire!”

“But who did it?”

“His name was Anders, the Orlesian merchant we had yesterday said he was executed, remember?”

“What kind of name is _that_?”

“Oh, I wonder what he looked like,” said the first serving girl.

“My cousin in Kirkwall says he was very handsome,” a grinning Coraline intervened as Anders tried to catch his breath after almost dying to a shrimp. “She says he looked like a dark Orlesian prince!”

There was a chorus of oohs and aahs.

“Did she meet him?” “Have you seen him?” “Did he really glow with the light of Andraste?” “Is it true he killed a hundred Templars on his own?” “I bet he was charming!”

“My friend said he healed the sick with just a wave of his hands in the streets of Kirkwall, like a miracle! And…” She shifted her tone to the lowest of whispers, forcing the girls to come closer, “he was a Grey Warden!”

“No!” “I can’t believe it!” “Maybe there was darkspawn involved!” A clamour of speculation rose around them as the other customers abandoned all pretence of discretion and joined the conversation.

Anders kicked her in the leg and she kicked him right back, winking discreetly. ‘Relax”, she mouthed as a couple of merchants from Starkhaven narrated the uprising of Kirkwall’s mages. From their grandiose descriptions, Coraline was quite certain neither of them had been in Kirkwall at the time (but then again, neither had she). The serving girl refilled their glasses on the house, provided she disclosed everything she knew about Anders, the dark and mysterious apostate with healing hands.

By the end of their meal, Anders had become a righteous sword-wielding knight who rode into town on a shining white steed to save his mage lover, a poor apostate healing the sick in the slums, asking nothing in return, and a handsome revolutionary who only wanted to see the mages of the Gallows freed. The real Anders was hovering between anger and hilarity at the outrageous lies Coraline was spinning shamelessly. When Coraline decided she had had her share of amusement at the expense of the locals, she slipped out the front door unnoticed, followed closely by Anders. Behind them, the patrons were arguing on the colour of the apostate’s eyes (blue or silver -a question of utmost importance).

“Was this really necessary?”

“It was just a bit of fun. And I barely twisted the truth,” she protested, a self-satisfied grin lingering on her lips.

“‘He slew a dozen Templars with his silver sword, armour glinting in the sunlight’? Come on.”

“Well, Justice wore an armour in spirit form. It counts.”

“'He dedicated his life to feeding the poor and healing the sick?"”

“Somehow, I'm pretty sure that was mostly true.” Sarcasm and sincerity mixed most peculiarly in her voice. Anders ignored the feeling in his throat it caused.

“Hair dark as the night sky?”

“Creative licence. No one cares about your hair colour, and it makes you seem dark and mysterious. Women love that, you know.” He rose an eyebrow and she rolled her eyes. “The point is to tell stories before the Chantry does. Any story is better than the one they’re probably already telling. Madman, Tevinter spy, dangerous bloodmage… They’ll uphold you as a reason to punish all mages if they get their way. This is just… damage control.”

“First hand experience, I assume?” he could not help but ask. She chuckled.

“Everything you know about the Fifth Blight was _heavily _redacted by the Chantry. Nothing I could do about it at the time.”

“You mean... There was no swamp witch involved?”

“Oh, no, there was. Unlike what the Chantry says, I never converted her to Andrastian faith, though. She’s pretty great.”

Anders went off to sell some of the healing potions and herbs he had acquired on their road and Coraline decided to explore the city for the afternoon. She had never been to Seleny before, preferring to travel through Antiva City where Zevran always played guide happily. She wandered through the bustling marketplace, full of haranguing vendors and bartering customers, until she found a little stand selling spices.

She had almost depleted her own resources, mostly due to the fact that she was now cooking for two, and was desperate to find some chili flakes. Her sweet tooth taking over her more reasonable side, she also bought figs, almonds, and dates from a Tevinter merchant, and a number of herbs and spices she simply could not live without. Her pack was much heavier by the end of her shopping spree, but considering it was mostly from candied orange peels, she was quite happy with the extra weight.

Ever since Zevran had taught her how to cook, she found the boiled meat and vegetables Fereldans favoured uneatable and simply _had_ to add spices. She traded coppers for cinnamon and ground ginger. She even bought some jasmine oil for herself, making the trader a little suspicious; it was uncommon to see travellers (Fereldans no less) with as much coin as she did. A risk well worth taking, in her opinion. Zevran and Leliana would have approved. She imagined Morrigan shaking her head at her. Of course, there would still be a shadow of a smile on her friend's lips, forever amused by her 'childish antics'. Coraline left the market stand with a heavy heart; she did truly miss her swamp witch.

She spent a while gossiping with merchants from Rivain. They all spoke Trade, of course, but she still used the opportunity to refresh her Rivaini. Quickly, she learned that tensions between the increasingly Andrastian nobles, the common folk with their polytheistic beliefs, and the Qun sympathizers were rising over in Rivain, so much so that some wise women had already led their folk away from the capital to settle in quieter villages. There were no news of the effect the uprising of the Gallows had had on the mages of the North, which only served to send Coraline in a spiral of useless theories and wild speculations.

* * *

She left Seleny almost by accident, wandering away from the slums and into the low-rolling countryside that laid north of the city. She stopped on a little promontory to eat an afternoon snack, feasting on dried grapes and candied fruits, glad to finally be alone. Not that Anders was not good company, but she needed some respite.

As the sun slowly travelled the heavens, she watched the shadows of the tall spiky rock formations that dominated the landscape move on the ground and wondered, not for the first time, if the sun sailed around Thedas or if Thedas moved around it. The only person she had ever mentioned this wild idea to was Morrigan, who had been very quiet for a long while after.

“Hello,” a voice said behind her, speaking Antivan. She turned around to see a woman standing there, a basket of herbs in her hands. She wore a red dress covered with an alchemist’s apron. “I saw you from over there, are you lost?”

“Ah, no, just… Enjoying the last rays of sunlight.” The woman smiled at her words, dimples appearing on her cheeks. She looked a little older than her, yet far less travel-weary.

“I’m Anna.” She pointed to her basket. “I’m a little bit of an herbalist.”

The lie came naturally. “Isolde. How is someone ‘a bit of’ an herbalist?”

They sat down on a stone nearby and Anna explained to her that even though she had learned everything from her mother, herbalist was still a word reserved to those with formal training. Coraline kept her talking with pointed questions about local flora, all the while enjoying the levity of the conversation.

While Anna counted the uses of sarsa morisca for her, Coraline decided that she deserved a little fun. A tilt of the head, fingers playing with her necklace, a slight grin… She could wear seduction like a comfortable cape, and soon enough, Anna was blushing at every smile.

It was easy, it always was, and Anna ended up inviting her ‘for dinner’ as the sun lowered, burning orange on the far horizon. In Antivan, that meant staying the night. Coraline considered refusing, the knowledge that she could have the woman if she wanted being satisfaction enough.

“I should get back,” she answered, putting a stop to her after all quite innocent antics. “My brother will worry.”

Anna chuckled. “I think you are old enough to take care of yourself,” she said. Coraline had to admit that she appreciated the attention, in the same way one enjoys a juicy peach or a soft fabric. Captivating for an instant, and then quickly forgotten for another short-lived interest. And after all, she had been travelling for weeks now; what harm was there in taking a short rest?

Her decision made, she followed Anna to her cottage in the hills on the edge on the city, where Coraline wondered for an instant if she would like to have a cottage too before banishing the thought -houses were for nobles and peasants, of which she was neither.

Anna was talking about herbalism, but Coraline barely listened, her thoughts wandering down a different road. She was no Grey Warden anymore -was she condemned to spend the rest of her life fleeing?

Her life had been a series of obligations, from the Circle to the Grey Wardens, but at least she had had something to do. A purpose she could pretend to care about. After she got that stupid manuscript and got rid of Gaxkang, what then? Running from the Templars, for the rest of her life? Anna smiled at her and she smiled back, shaking her head. Time to put these concerns to rest, in the best way she knew how.

“I only have one night,” she warned Anna, just in case that had not been clear.

The woman chuckled. “I am only asking for one night.”

Satisfied with the answer, she kissed her, because this was what she had come here for. Her lips were soft against hers, warm and inviting. She sighed into the kiss, allowing Anna to deepen it. The herbalist peppered kisses in her neck, below her ears, on her jaw.

Coraline let herself enjoy Anna’s breathy moaning, slipping a hand down, over her apron. She kissed her neck, letting her teeth rake over the soft skin, eliciting more lovely sounds from her ephemeral lover. She let her hands work, almost automatically, removing the woman’s work dress.

Anna tried to answer in kind, one hand working Coraline’s belt. She chuckled, moving her hand away gently. “We have all night,” she chastised, untying the last button on Anna’s dress, which promptly fell to the floor.

Coraline took a step back, admiring her handiwork; Anna’s cheeks were flushed dark, her eyes widened with desire. She brushed from her collarbone to her shoulder tenderly, her fingers barely touching the skin. “You look absolutely gorgeous, you know.” Anna’s grin turned bashful. “Now, be good and turn around.”

The woman obeyed, sending a thrill of excitation down in Coraline’s stomach, and she went to palm her breasts, peppering hard kisses on her neck from behind. Truth be told, she did not derive any particular pleasure from getting Anna to do what she wanted; no, only the seduction had been delightful. This was just the icing on an already very tasty cake.

Anna was only wearing her smalls now, and Coraline could almost smell the arousal coming off of her. She paced herself, teasing her neck, her jaw, tracing the curve of her waist, always keeping a hand to rub circles on her nipples, hard and burning.

Anna, she could feel, was getting impatient, her hips rocking up against hers, her moaning getting faster and shallower. “What do you want?” she could not resist asking, as a sort of victory lap after winning her little game. Not so innocent, now.

“Maker, you. You, please.” The frustration in Anna’s voice music to her ears, she chuckled in her neck, already satisfied.

“You’re going to need to be more specific.” She pinched her nipple as she talked, her teasing on the edge of taunting.

“Isolde! Please… Touch me.”

“I already am.” To demonstrate, she grabbed her breasts and squeezed, adding a slow thrust of her hips against her ass for good measure. Anna’s squeal was unexpected, but welcome.

“You’re a tease.” Anna’s words were choppy, slightly annoyed and yet still interspersed with irregular moans. “Down -down there. For Andraste’s sake, please!”

Coraline did not mention that doing anything for Andraste’s sake was a little late, considering the woman had been dead for ages. Even so, she relented, slipping a hand between Anna’s legs, where her heat and her wetness welcomed her. Anna’s legs trembled. She grabbed her cotton smalls, pushing them down. Anna wiggled her legs and her last item of clothing was discarded on the floor.

Anna whimpered as she traced along her length with a finger, her head rolling back, eyes closed. Coraline set a leisurely pace, circling her clitoris, taking her time to caress her inner thigh when Anna’s moans grew more urgent. She was indeed a tease, not that she saw anything wrong with it. No one had ever complained, or at least not for long.

Anna begged just enough to make Coraline pick up her rhythm slightly. Anna’s hips bucked under her, and Coraline took her hand for Anna’s breast and finally, finally, gave her lover what she had been asking for through half-cries and frantic whispers.

She slipped a finger in her, wiggling ever so slightly. Then out, then in, then out.

“Good?” She asked, even though she had no doubt over the answer.

“More,” was the only response she got, and she giggled at Anna’s eagerness, complying with her demand with two fingers. She heard her lover’ pleased gasp and curled her fingers, teasing still. Anna bucked under her hand, soft and slick. Coraline kissed her neck, grazing her delicate skin with her teeth, pumping her fingers inside her.

She could sense the pressure mounting inside of her lover, her breaths shallower, her legs unsteady. She kept moving in the same way, adjusting her pace and pressure according to Anna’s moans, thrusting her fingers inside of her, rubbing circles on her clitoris with her other hand.

Coraline let her belly heat up, desire just enough to keep her interested in what she was doing. Her arousal felt quite manageable, which was the way she liked it. In the reckless abandon that true passion demanded, the half-truths and seductions and tricks she delighted in so much could not exist.

Even younger, she had preferred to see her trysts as exercises in self-control rather than the fulfilling of a physical need. After all, so thoroughly seducing someone, without letting oneself be seduced, seemed the pinnacle of deceit, although so very harmless for all parties involved. And besides, she figured it made her a more attentive lover, so her games had no losers, especially when people were always so eager to take what she was willing to give.

“You’re doing just fine,” she encouraged, lips inches from her ear, when Anna’s hips started to roll wildly against hers, in that exquisite desperation that comes with unchecked desire. And Anna came with an incoherent yelp to the Maker, her knees almost caving, her back arching so much that her head rolled back against Coraline’s collarbone. Pleased with her handiwork, Coraline took out her fingers and brought her hand to Anna’s hips, stabilizing her trembling form.

She rubbed slow circles on Anna’s inner thigh, giving her time to catch her breath.

“Alright?”

“Mmh.”

“Glad to hear it.” She leaned forward to kiss her shoulder. “We’re just getting started.”

Much later, Coraline wiped herself off on the tunic she was still wearing and sat on the bed next to Anna as her lover chased her last aftershock gently, watching her chest heave with a self satisfied grin. Anna’s skin was glistening with sweat, shining like precious gemstones.

“You look like the cat that stole the fish,” Anna noted with a yawn as she regained her breath. Coraline only grinned wider in response, the taste of her still on her lips.

Anna felt a tinge of guilt for not reciprocating at all, but it passed quickly, overshadowed by the exhaustion and the bliss. They said that Fereldans were boring, but Maker help her, there was nothing farther from the truth.

“Stay,” she whispered, catching Isolde’s wrist as her lover got up from the undone bed.

Isolde leaned over her, kissing her brow, caressing her cheek. “It’s alright. Sleep now.” Through semi-closed lids, she watched as the woman picked up her cape and put it back on. She heard her front door creak and close, and fell asleep with a satisfied heart.

* * *

It was a clear night and Coraline spent what she had left of it wandering silently around town, avoiding patrols and thieves. Her path led her to the edge of the swamp, dark and mysterious. Sleep, as usual, was eluding her, though she did not mind. She watched the stars travel in the heavens and let herself pretend she belonged there, in this street, in this city. In the shadows, it was easy to pretend.

At first light, she went to the bath house and cleaned up, doing her best to ignore the curious glances the other women there threw her. Her scars always drew attention. Usually, because of the chosen profession of so many Antivans, scars did not faze them much. Some of hers, however, clearly did not come from daggers, especially the claw mark on her shoulder. And so, they looked.

Due to her time in the Circle, Coraline did not have any real notion of modesty. It had made Alistair blush like the virgin he had been back on the road they had shared. Zevran had laughed about it and, more than that, he had understood. Growing up in a whorehouse also tended to strip all prudery from someone. Still, she washed quickly. She did not mind being naked, but she minded the scars, and not just because they made her more recognizable.

She crossed the waking marketplace on her way back to the inn and bought some pastries from an Tevinter merchant. His prices were outrageous, but she would have sold Alistair’s kingdom for sweet rolls. She was not even sure Alistair would have minded, as long as she shared.

“There you are,” Anders greeted her as she entered the inn. He was eating breakfast gruel and -wait. Was this really him? It took Coraline an embarrassingly long moment to gather her thoughts.

“You cut off your beard,” she cried, pointing an accusing finger at his bare face. He looked ten years younger without the hair, even trimmed, on his chin. He seemed to have also washed, which helped tremendously, and his hair seemed healthier, probably due to the absence of grease and the trimmed ends. She wondered for a second if merging with Justice had stopped his ageing, the thought barely forming before being forgotten under Anders’ sheepish smile. And was that a new tunic? Either that or he had managed to clean the bloodstains off.

“Good morning to you too.”

“It looks better. You almost look like a human being again,” she said, not resisting the urge to tease him. Sitting down in front of him, she frowned at his choice of breakfast before handing him a sweet roll. “Breakfast upgrade, you’re welcome.”

“You’re in a cheery mood,” he said sleepily.

She ignored his comment. “I got a supply of cookies for the road. I hate oatmeal.”

“I know, you tell me every morning.”

They ate their sweet rolls in blessed silence, each savouring the treat. After finishing his, Anders still went back to his gruel under Coraline’s disgusted glare. She was starting to believe he was simply eating this no-good, horrible food to annoy her. Maker's arse-cheeks, the man did not even bother to add _cinnamon_ to it.

He told her that he had bartered some of the potions he had brewed for a razor. Coraline expected the merchants to have fleeced him and was starting to regret not going with him the previous day, but he had, surprisingly, managed to get a nice sum for his wares.

It was impressive, really, considering Antivan merchants prided themselves on being sleazier than the average brothel owners. She was even more surprised when he showed her the package of herbs he had somehow got his hands on. There was even some Felandaria leaves, and she knew it was almost as rare as lyrium. She had heard Morrigan pest for days on end after losing her supply one time during the Blight. Not even Alistair had dared tease her about it then. Anders seemed quite pleased with himself, explaining how got the herbs as a reward for helping out a rich merchant’s sick child. That had her rolling her eyes, especially after the precautions she had taken, hiding his staff and all, but considering the merchant’s gratitude, she had to admit the risk of Templars was minimal.

Coraline found herself not really listening to him. It was not that his tale was boring, or that he was a bad storyteller. He did really look better without the beard, though. And who would have guessed a bath could do such wonders?

They crossed the marketplace on their way out of the city, crossing paths with Anna. Coraline barely waved her good morning and Anna sauntered right over to her to press a light kiss on her cheek.

Coraline threw her a smile, although a little annoyed; they had met yesterday, and now the day (and night) had passed. She had moved on the moment she had walked out her door, and Anna would have been wise to do the same. They had even agreed on one night, which clearly meant there was no point dragging it out. Still, she gave no hint of her displeasure.

“Whenever you’re in Seleny again, my door is open,” Anna offered with a wink before going on about her business, leaving Anders to smile lewdly. She rolled her eyes, her mood worsening somewhat. She had no plans on ever coming back to Seleny anyway.

* * *

“That’s why you weren’t at the inn! And to think I worried about you…” He shook his head dramatically. “So, how did you get the pretty herbalist into your bed?” Anders was feeling better. The city merchants had paid a good price for the few healing potions he had sold them, he had eaten a brioche topped with a truly outrageous amount of icing on top for breakfast, he finally had his staff back after spending his first night without it in years, and he had gotten a haircut. Coraline sniffled at him.

“I didn’t. It was her bed.”

“Cheeky. But I should have known. You were a pretty terrible flirt in Vigil’s Keep, even kept up with my puns.” She had never instigated anything that he could remember, true, but she had taken most of the opportunities for an innuendo he had given her. Not that it would have gone anywhere, of course. He had only been thinking of Karl at the time.

She sighed, grimacing somewhat. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.”

“Of course you should have. It was adorable.” And he meant it. She had been funny and charming, when she dropped the commanding and stern attitude. Had he been younger and, well, not in love with someone else, he might even have been serious about the flirting back then.

“No, I was your superior. It wasn’t.. right.”

Anders watched her with narrowed eyes as she stared at her feet, his previous mood all but forgotten. Somehow, images of Templars and mages in the Circle dug their way into his mind again, as they had when he had brought up Cullen days earlier. When he spoke, his voice was unwavering. “Don’t think for one second you could have gotten me to do anything I didn’t want to do.”

She clicked her tongue, mocking him. “Subtle.” The jab, along with her side-smile, told him she meant to say thank you.


	6. Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit

Anders still had nightmares almost every night. And almost every night, Coraline shook him out of them, offered him some water and went back to her own bedroll without question or reproach. He knew he should at least thank her, but the dreams always took him at the throat, leaving him breathless. And after the night had passed, in the cold light of the morning, he never found the courage to bring it up.

They crossed Northern Antiva slowly; it was an expanse of inhospitable wastes, populated only by dog-like creatures Coraline called jackals and bands of wild goats that ran up and down the steep mountainous slopes of the region with the agility of cats. They did not even bother following a path anymore. There were no trading roads here, and people did not dwell in this dry, dusty land. To the East laid a forest, but Coraline had warned that it was populated by the Antivan Dalish. Anders had not heard much about them, but by her words, it seemed they were far less amenable than the Sabrae clan near Kirkwall.

Luckily for him, Coraline knew her way around the wilderness. She had shrugged him off when he had asked how she knew the area, and he had not insisted. Still, their route was hard, far less pleasant than the slowly winding paths of Southern Antiva. The ground was rocky and uneasy to walk on, the vegetation dry and spiky and ruining his breeches (if such a thing was even possible at this point). Every night, he had to heal the many small cuts on his legs, if only to prevent an infection. And he did it discreetly, because he really should not bother her with this. The wind was biting, blowing harsh sands around them, the nights colder than he would have thought.

He could not believe it, but he almost missed Kirkwall. _Almost_.

She seemed so much better accustomed to the harshness of the wild than he was. In fact, she did not seemed fazed by it whatsoever. Anders had to remind himself that she was Commander Amell -of course she would not be bothered by things as trivial as wind or dust or cold. He, on the other hand, was terribly bothered. No, decidedly, Anders was not cut out for the wilderness.

Fortunately, Coraline always seemed to have a distraction for when he started brooding. He had no idea how she did it, but she always managed to know when his mood shifted. And so they walked on, Anders trying to ignore the wind and the bushes and the pebble lodged in his left boot while Coraline made jokes about the pirate invasion of Antiva in 6:70 Steel.

He did not quite know what to make of her, really; she had never talked this much when he had been under her command in Vigil’s Keep. He studied her discreetly, the unbraided hair, the loose fitting shirt and cape, the loud absence of Warden armour. The woman next to him had very little in common with his old Commander.

As their campfire crackled and rabbit stew warmed their bellies, Coraline veered their previously light discussion back towards more serious matters.

“You said your anger corrupted Justice,” she started.

Anders looked up from the book of common Rivaini phrases he had bought in Seleny. She was sitting cross-legged on the other side of the fire, looking at him placidly through the flames. It was to be one of those conversations again. They had those every once in a while, where she argued with him out of the blue; it seemed to him she did it for fun more than anything, which he did not quite understand.

“Once he was inside me, he… changed. He was no longer the Justice you knew, but a force of Vengeance. It was my fault.” He wished she would drop the subject. He had been travelling alongside her long enough to know she would not. Just when he was about to get to the chapter about sightseeing in Ayesleigh, too.

She brought a hand under her chin, examining him thoughtfully with her overly sharp eyes. “What’s the difference? Between Justice and Vengeance?”

He sighed condescendingly, already annoyed, and parroted the old mages who had taught him in the Circle. “Justice is a spirit, embodying our virtues. Vengeance is a demon, preying on our sins. You know that already.”

He saw the corner of her mouth rise up almost imperceptibly. Was she mocking him? “Look who’s repeating Chantry propaganda now,” she teased. “Next thing I know, I’ll hear you recite the Threnodies.”

His day in the sand had already frayed his nerves, and now, the insolent twinkle of her eyes made him want to throttle her. “Stop exaggerating. All the texts written on the subject are clear on the classification of demons and spirits.”

“All the texts written by Chantry scholars and Circle mages, you mean. But that wasn’t my question. This is not about the denizens of the Fade, although that’s a conversation I’d love to have. I was merely wondering about the difference between Justice and Vengeance as concepts. What separates them?”

Anders knew the answer, having spent countless nights ruminating on that very difference before. He still thought about ending the conversation right there, but decided to indulge her, if only so she would get to her point. She always had one. “Justice is about restoring balance, about fixing the world. Vengeance is about getting even.”

“Alright. By your definitions, what actions have you taken, then, that were vengeful?”

Anders stared at her as if she had sprouted a second head, his frustration forgotten. “I blew up a chantry,” he enunciated very slowly.

“Why?”

“Where is this going?” Anders lashed out; she was still smiling, just a small rise of the lips on the left corner of her mouth. Annoying. “What is the point of this?”

“Come on, answer me. You’ve nothing better to do anyway.”

Anders did not even have to think about it, the answer pouring out of him like a long-kept secret. “I wanted to change the world. To prove that the Circles were not a solution.”

“So… You were _not _trying to get even with the Grand Cleric?”

“Why does- Oh, I see. Very funny. Congratulations.”

She lost her smile. “I am completely serious. If you believe that intent is what divides Justice and Vengeance, then you also have to believe that destroying the Chantry was not an act of Vengeance.”

So that’s what she was hung up on. His corruption of the spirit. For some reason, she kept coming back to it, as if she had any idea what she was talking about. More than annoying, it was infuriating. More than infuriating, it was heart-breaking, because every time she mentioned Justice, he had to think back to the friend that died to save him. To Hawke’s blade, to the Gallows, to Kirkwall. To the mages he did not save, to the friends that did not help.

He had never spoken of what had happened in the aftermath of the Chantry explosion, apart from bribes of general information here and there. It was easier to pretend that day had not really happened, just another blurry, tragic memory to throw onto the pile. Sweep everything behind a door, close it and throw away the key.

Amell -Cora- was still looking at him, waiting for his answer. She looked almost earnest, but Anders had no intention of letting her win that argument. Not when she knew _nothing_ of the matter.

“Fine. Even if I agreed -she rolled her eyes- what do you make of the time Justice took over and I almost killed an innocent girl?”

She was silent an instant and he congratulated himself on having stumped her. “I thought you said you merged together into a new being. You’re describing possession.”

That she seemed more worried that angry disarmed him, his annoyance melting at the frowning of her brows. “Yes! Wait, no. Sometimes, I was more Anders, and sometimes, I was more Justice. We were still one. You’re avoiding my question.”

“I don’t know enough about the situation to answer and you know it. Maybe it was Vengeance. The point is, it happened before the Chantry explosion, right?” Anders nodded, already seeing where she was going and not liking it one bit. “Then Vengeance turned back to Justice. Ergo, not corrupted.”

“You’re impossible,” he whined under her smug look. Despite the subject, he had to admit he did not completely hate that she could talk circles around him. She grinned and he resolved to never, ever, say so out loud. The last thing she needed were encouragements.

“You know, I once met a Spirit who told me, and I quote: ‘I am Justice. I am Vengeance.’ I would have asked for some precisions, but I was on a quest to steal Andraste’s ashes from a dragon cult at the time.” Her gaze drifted off to the landscape around them for a moment. “Still, it makes sense. There is no reason Justice and Vengeance can’t coexist. After all, our actions can be driven by several motives simultaneously -helping others, hurting those who have hurt us. It’s not far off to presume that spirits would- Are you even listening?”

“I’m sorry, no. I stopped at ‘dragon cult’.”

“Look who’s impossible now.”

“… A dragon cult? How do I not know about this?”

Coraline relented, spending the rest of their evening telling him about the insanity of her quest to Haven, from the crazy cultists to the dragon fight, adding some details for dramatic flair and omitting many others along the way. What had happened to the ashes of Andraste was best kept secret.

* * *

The sun hung high in the sky, and barely a shadow appeared on the ground. Still, winter meant they kept their capes on, if only to hide from the biting wind. Coraline and Anders took shelter under a large rock for lunch, where they shared the last of Coraline’s almonds and some dried apricots for a luxurious dessert. She had hoped the bag would last longer, not accounting for her own dreadful snacking habits. A terrible mistake, which meant she would need to get back to eating oatmeal for breakfast soon. She grimaced at the thought, before trying to concentrate on her reading. They had had a hard hike in the morn, escalating rocks and crossing wild territory, and neither minded a small rest before going on with their journey. Anders was dozing off next to her and she was using her time to go over Enchanter Remille’s papers.

Anders grumbled in his slowly regrowing beard. “I should really get back to practising.” She tore her eyes from her reading and stopped her mindless tapping of the feet to ask for precisions. “You know, practise.” He waved his hand around as if that explained everything. It did not. He narrowed his eyes at her. “Come to think of it, I haven’t seen you practise at all.”

“Practise what?”

“Willpower, of course.”

She opened and closed her hand a few times, the Veil coming closer and retreating back in unison with her movement. It was the only practise she knew, something Wynne had taught her during the Blight. Morrigan had scoffed then, saying such manipulations were useless and that she should practice her aim instead. Coraline had been forced to agree, seeing as half her fireballs missed their targets at the time. “What else is there?” she asked with a shrug.

“You don’t exercise at all?” he asked, wide-eyed and a little warily.

Coraline shrugged again. “It shouldn’t be a shock to you. I didn’t when we were travelling around the swamps either.”

“I thought that was because we were conserving mana for fights!”

“Nope. What kinds of exercises should I be doing, anyway?”

He sighed the long-suffering sigh of ignored teachers. “I know you left the Circle just after your Harrowing, but this is just ridiculous. Didn’t you learn any proper forms? At all?”

“Not really. No one told me I was supposed to practise daily. You know apprentices only do theory.”

He shook his head before getting up and taking the usual Circle spellcasting stance. Feet wide apart, shoulders at a slight angle, main hand forward and lesser hand down, palm facing down. “I’ll show you.”

She had never really seen him cast outside of combat before, except for a healing spell here and there. At the time, her other responsibilities had prevented her from paying him much attention. Watching him now, however, was the most enchanting thing she had seen in a long while.

Every mage had a style. Wynne had been academic, Morrigan ruthless, herself pragmatic. But Anders. Anders was soft and flowing. From where she was sitting, she could feel the mana swirl gently through his hands, dancing slowly at his command. Where she would have cast quickly, he took his time, his fingers subtly bending the energies to his desires. His Circle training had shone through during his time with the Wardens, but he now tended to cast with his whole upper body instead of solely from the shoulders as they were taught by the Enchanters. Coraline remembered the Dalish cast with their whole bodies, prompting her to wonder where he had learned his new tricks. His style had certainly improved, even smoother than it had been years before. Her breathing slowed as she watched him. He moved almost like he was dancing to a song she could not hear, and the magic danced with him upon his fingers.

He did not pay her any attention, concentrated on his exercises. He wiggled his fingers, ever so gently, and lightning played between them. Coraline sat up to get a better view -for learning purposes, of course. She could feel the mana moving around him, slow and disciplined. His movements were controlled, graceful. The Fade swayed, perfectly under his command, the energies he conjured flowing through the Veil effortlessly. A turn of his feet, a wave of his hands. A spin of his hips. He moved in unison with the magic, slow and elegant, far more skilled than she would ever be.

Coraline let herself admire his control as he wove the Fade around him almost languidly. Her eyes closed unnoticed, heavy with her last days of sleeplessness, and she drifted off into sleep.

The Veil shook, making her jump out of her rest. Anders was standing in front of her, one hand on his hips, the other in a snapping position, and a grin on his face.

“You’ve been napping for a couple of hours now. I didn’t want to wake you, but we have to move along.” She blushed crimson.

“Oh, sorry. I was just-” watching you cast, she did not say. “Yeah, let’s go.”

“I’m making you practise actual forms tonight. I can’t believe you've never learned any. Irving's prized student, my ass.”

She put on a falsely offended expression. “Hey, I think I did pretty well for myself regardless.”

He eyed her critically as she packed her bag and put a hand up in a V sign. Lightning crackled between his fingers. “Can you do that?” It was a small, discreet spell, but controlling lightning, the most volatile of the elemental branches, between two fingers was a small feat of mastery, which Coraline could still recognize and admire well enough.

“… That’s not fair, everyone knows I suck at lightning. Well, except for making giant storms, of course.”

Anders sighed deeply and put his hand down. “Control _is_ important. That’s why we practise.”

She shrugged. “My control is doing just fine. Lightning’s only use is killing anyway, and that little thingy you’re doing isn’t going to fry anyone’s head off.”

“You shouldn’t underestimate lightning like that.” He grinned and she felt like she had just missed a joke.

* * *

That same evening, as they made camp, Anders insisted she study ‘the correct way’.

“No, just… Build the pressure slowly around your hand. Pull, but only a little. If you feel the Veil about to snap back, stop pulling.”

“But the Veil snapping is what I want.”

“For actual spells, yes. This is a control exercise, you’re not trying to manifest anything.” He insisted, so she tried. The Veil snapped. She rolled her eyes, her hand tingling.

“Again,” Anders said, maybe just a little too imperiously, which made her raise an eyebrow. Still, she obeyed.

By the time their stew was simmering, Coraline had the exercise down and Anders was beaming like a proud teacher. Her head was throbbing and she could barely feel her hands, tingling with residual Fade energy, but she was just as proud as he was.

“Well, see. That’s not too bad.”

She glared at him. “I still don’t see the point of this,” she complained.

“It’s meant to help you gauge the power you need. That way, you never use too much.”

She snorted over her stew. “That way, you don’t scare the Templars, you mean.”

“That too. But mostly, it’s about Primal magic. I know you veer more towards the Entropy School and the intensity of those spells can be controlled directly through willpower. It’s a lot harder to do with the elements, and it’s much easier to simply pull just the right amount of energy from the Fade. Think lighting a candle or creating a firestorm.”

Anders let her think for a moment until she exclaimed, “Oh, I get why you would have new mages do the exercises.”

He nodded. “So they avoid setting the whole library on fire.”

“Yeah! I remember a few casualties when I studied. Trees and darkspawn, mostly.” She remembered her training sessions with Morrigan, with Alistair cheering her on every time she set fire to anything -except his hair, but that had only happened once. There had been no time for slow and steady learning, given, well, everything. Instead, she had opted for the dangerous way of figuring things out through trial and error, which, she had to commend herself, had worked out pretty well.

“You got lucky, you know. Apostates are known to die from their own spells when they’re not Circle-trained.” Coraline almost cut him off to tell him he was reciting Chantry propaganda again, but she held her tongue. “That’s why you’ve never managed lightning, by the way. It doesn’t have the gradual progression of ice and fire, so you don’t have time to react when you overdose it.”

“I’ve got ice down, at least,” she said, showing him as her hands covered in frost with barely a thought. He looked on approvingly.

“I thought you were more the fire type.”

“Only in fights. It scares people more.”

“Well, that’s perfectly sane. I’m rubbish at fire myself, but we can work on lightning.” The memory of their first meeting crossed her mind; the first spell she had seem him perform had involved burning a number of darkspawn to ashes. He ignored her curious glance and launched into a lengthy explanation for a small lightning spell, which she listened to studiously.

In theory, Coraline already knew how to cast a lightning spell -most variations were simple enough to figure out. In practise, however, she could not do nice little tricks like Anders, or even aim precisely. What she _could _do, however, was fire giant bolts of electricity in front of her, usually destroying anything -and anyone- standing there.

On one hand, Coraline was not sure she _wanted_ control over her lightning, its purpose being to obliterate everything in the largest radius possible. On the other, Anders was clearly willing to teach her, and she made a point to never refuse freely offered knowledge.

Anders opened his palm upwards, bending his fingers slightly. She felt the Fade move with him and sure enough, he held lightning in his hand, like a miniature storm was taking place on his palm.

Eager to try, Coraline followed his gesture, opening her fingers into a claw. She reached through the Veil as she had done a million times before, taking what power she wanted. Instead of the nice little lightning floating above her palm like Anders’, however, what she got was a bolt of electricity running through her entire body. She felt her muscles tighten uncontrolled, her skin tingling like she’d bitten into metal. The electricity ran through her, vibrating as it went, and for a split second, her heart quivered. When she came to, Anders was at her side, his hands quickly working a healing spell over her. When had she fallen down?

“I’m sorry, I thought-” Anders was still trying to apologize frantically when the shock left her, his magic helping the recovery. She was laying on her back, Anders’ hand behind her head. He had probably just saved her from a concussion.

“T’s alright. I fucked up.” She needed water. Anders worked another battery of healing spells to heal the burned skin on her hands.

“No, it’s my fault. I should have known, you’ve never tried this before, I shouldn’t have asked-”

“Calm down, no one’s dead.” From the crestfallen look on his face, she was not helping. She rolled her eyes and hoisted herself up. “Thanks for the patch up. Stew’s ready, pass me a bowl, will you?”

He gave her a serving of rabbit stew, apologizing some more. Coraline smiled reassuringly, wondering if the difference in their approaches was only due to his Circle training and her lack thereof, or their natural predispositions.

He had gotten out at thirty or so, when she had learned most of her real magic outside its walls. The Circle valued control, the world demanded power. Pretty lightning balls and dancing flames were all nice and fancy, but were fatally inefficient against bandits and darkspawn. She did not mind that her magic was deemed inelegant -it belonged to her, terrible and unbridled. Yet her lack of finesse had some real downsides, like the quality of her wards. Anders’, she had noticed, were more subtle, more finely weaved, which in turn made them stronger.

“Show me again,” she insisted after he finished eating.

“I just explained to you how dangerous it is. With your… _unusual_ training, you might electrocute yourself for real next time.” She knew he almost said ‘lack of training’, and something in her rebelled. So what if almost no one had ever bothered to teach her? She had done just fine on her own! Void, she had done far better than most mages in any Circle ever had.

“You know, if you don’t show me, I’ll just have to try again on my own.” She put her right hand up in a claw to lend some credence to her threat. Anders narrowed his eyes at her, practically daring her. She threw him a haughty glance and pretended to concentrate on her hand. She inhaled deeply-

“Alright, fine! You madwoman.” He got up, stepped around the fire and went to sit in front of her. She smiled, victorious. “This time, if anything goes wrong, I’ll end the spell before you kill the both of us.” He raised his hands and placed them around hers, ready to dispel lightning, before giving her the signal to try.

He had freckles on his hands. Coraline was not sure what to do with this new information, so she closed her eyes, putting the knowledge out of her mind before concentrating on the spell. She could feel it coming, slowly, slowly… Anders ended it just before it blew up in their faces.

“You’re pulling way too much from the Fade. Go slower,” he tried to explain.

“I am already going slow.”

“You can’t go slow while radiating nervous energy when you cast. Slowness requires stillness. Your foot is vibrating, by the way.” He was right. She was sitting loosely cross-legged and the feet that was closer to her was indeed vibrating. She stopped.

“I can’t help it. I always do that.”

“It’s amplifying the lightning, you can’t cast like this.”

Coraline mulled this new information over. She did not feel more nervous than usual. Slightly more frustrated, maybe. “But I’m always like this.” He frowned.

“Always?”

He looked concerned, which he really did not ought to be. She simply had, in her teachers’ words in Kinloch, a ‘nervous disposition’. She fidgeted a little, so what? “It’s not that bad.”

Anders shook his head and sighed. “Lightning demands more than concentration. Any unconscious tension will magnify it tenfold. I am not letting you try again.”

“I’m not tense!” Anders simply pointed to her feet, which had started shaking slightly again. “Fine. I won’t try lightning again,” she relented. She was not curious enough to risk electrocution, even with a spirit healer at her side.

“Thank you. Maybe we can try again another time.” She rolled her eyes.

Later that night, as the embers of their fire dimmed and Anders finally put down his book and went to sleep, he felt slow waves of mana moving around his travel companion. Curious, he tried to look over Coraline’s sleeping form, to no avail. She had her back turned to him and her cape was covering her completely. Still, he could feel a faint ebb and flow of magic around her. This was a spell, assuredly, though he had no idea what she was doing. Surely, she was not…? His cheeks turned crimson at the unwanted image his treacherous mind conjured. No, this was ridiculous. Besides, she seemed completely still.

Doing his very best to ignore his previous thought, he concentrated on the movement of mana around. She was not practising her control over the Fade; this was a real spell. He could feel the energy leaking into the real world, though for what purpose he could not say. It was a soothing, serene coming and going of mana, so unlike the downpour of energy she had caused when trying lightning. Slowly, he found that his breath fell in rhythm with it, and sleep took him gently.

Nightmares did not find him that night.


	7. Fire and Water

Most trade in Antiva happened on the roads along the coastline, which mean that highwaymen tended to stay around the well-travelled paths around the Rialto Bay. This explained why Coraline was so surprised when they walked right into an ambush in the rocky, inhospitable hills of the northern Antivan wastes.

They had started their day under a lazy sun, Coraline practising her Fade-control during breakfast. Still, they had gone on, Anders eager to see Rivain after the descriptions Coraline had made of it. As for Coraline, she found herself of two minds. She wanted to learn Anders’ spells, if only because all knowledge was worth gathering, but practising tired her, leaving her vulnerable during the nights.

Gaxkang had not bothered her since that couple of nights south of Seleny, luckily. She did not count on her luck holding, however, and therefore eased up on the practising, frustrating herself in the process. She could not even let her mind wander during the day, as she needed to be alert and mindful of their road. Maker forbid she let Anders lead the way, he would take them directly to the Gates of the Black City itself. The man had no sense of direction whatsoever.

Putting every thought of magic and demons aside, she took stock of her travelling companion.

Anders still did not smile much, which Coraline understood -to a degree. He had lost, well, himself, after all. Crossing into Rivain, away from the Templars and the Chant’s hatred might help, yet she held little hope. The man was, for all intents and purposes, in pieces, and she did not know him well enough to help. Still, when she noticed out of the corner of her eye that his shoulders dropped a little too low or that his face contracted a little too much, she distracted him by narrating outrageous tales of kings and pirates that she had heard along her travels.

She had quickly noticed he liked stories about pirates and thieves quite a lot and tended to shun those about squabbling nobles, except when there were mistresses and assassins involved. She made a mental note of getting her hands on Master Tethras’ Hard in Hightown. It was hardly great literature, but she was sure Anders would adore it.

Besides, he was helping her with magic (sort of), so the least she could do was make him chuckle with dirty limericks every once in a while.

She was halfway into a folk retelling of the story of the Queen of Antiva (it involved murder, monarchy, and a massive amount of money) when things finally went sideways. She should have been expecting it, their journey had been far too smooth for far too long. Good things rarely lasted.

The telltale sound of an arrow reached her ears and she raised a wall of rocks around them, working off old instincts. The arrow lodged itself on this impromptu shield. It took her barely a second to assess the risk. They had just entered a small ravine, sandy cliff-faces of maybe three meters on each side, the path winding in front of them. No clear escape. She could not see their attackers, yet.

No, they were here. Three armed men in front of them at the bend of the path. Swords and daggers, unmatched armour pieces. This meant highwaymen, and probably desperate ones, too. Two more behind. Archers on the cliffs. “Archers first,” she ordered Anders, drawing a long dagger from her cape and placing herself in front of him. It would be harder without her staff, but battle focused her. Impending death had a way of doing that.

One spell, the three men slept. Two spells, an archer caught fire. Three spells, one of the men behind them got caught screaming in a nightmare. Four, five, six. She felt Anders cast ice and lightning at her side, picking off the archers. Seven, eight. Ice and earth, shattering one of them, shard of blood melting on the ground. The two men behind them dead, the archers either fleeing or dead, she turned back to the ones cutting the path forward. They were shaking off the sleeping spell.

One fled, realizing he had bitten off more than he could chew. She stopped his escape with a Crushing Prison, quickly followed by a nasty Death Hex. She did not even bother to watch him die. Ice from Anders, illusions from her. One frozen in a nightmare, one to go. She threw a glyph of repulsion in front of Anders, habit taking over. Protect your mages. The last man standing reached them howling in fury. Both of them used Mind Blast, the go-to spell for mages in close combat. The bandit stopped in his tracks, his gaze unfocused, reality slipping from him. Coraline glided next to him and with a thrust of her dagger, he fell to the ground.

Dead.

The last one, shaking off the nightmare and the ice, took a last look at them and turned to run. Coraline unleashed a fireball his way, killing him on impact

It had taken maybe a minute. She forced her gaze away from the bodies, took a deep breath, and turned to Anders.

“Any injuries?”

“All good. That last one was not necessary.” His cheeks had coloured with the effort. He had gotten better since his days in Vigil’s Keep, where he had been confined in a purely healing role, any offensive moves reserved for her and Velanna. He was a fast caster, although his flowery style took away from his efficiency slightly. Coraline felt somewhat reassured, at least, seeing he had the range to defend himself without trouble.

“Yes it was. We just killed his friends, the sane thing to do for him is to run straight to the Templars. I’m not taking any chances.” She conscientiously cleaned her dagger. A gift from her favourite assassin, who would never forgive her if blood stains rusted the metal.

“I suppose you’re right,” Anders sighed, frowning nonetheless. He had a good heart, of course he disagreed with her actions. Coraline, however, knew that survival primed on morality.

“Well.” She surveyed the carnage. It felt gloomily familiar, the bodies strewn about, the smell of blood already rising from the earth. A few hungry birds approaching. “We need to leave. If someone comes across the scene, we’ll have Templars at our heels.”

They hurried north-east after that, cutting through the hills. The border was a few days away, unguarded. Coraline was already making plans; if they were pursued, they would press North into the forests, where Templars would not follow. There was one upside to folk tales and old legends at least: it scared the weak-minded and the superstitious, and Templars tended to be both.

Between them and the shelter of said forest, however, laid sandy hills and rocky terrain where hiding was nigh-impossible, especially when Coraline was unwilling to venture into caves. She herself had no qualms with a little darkness, but she remembered Anders’ reactions to the Deep Roads. He had been good at hiding it, and at the time, she had had more important things to do than talk to him about it, but still, she had noticed the clammy complexion, the sweat on his forehead, and the panic in his eyes. As long as there were other alternatives, she had no intention of dragging the man underground, even though she was certain he would not dare protest.

Not to mention the possibility of tainted rats. She had not survived this long to die of a rat bite.

After a day and a half of fast-paced hiking, Coraline finally felt like they had put enough distance between them and the scene of the fight. Anders had let her lead the way, keeping her pace without a complaint, even when she had woken him at sun up and made him eat breakfast on the road. It had been the first time since they had started to travel together that she woke up before him. That evening, they made camp near a small creek and Coraline forced herself to keep still (Anders had said she needed to be more mindful of her fidgeting if she wanted to cast lightning like he did) while Anders bathed. She tried looking over the way they had come, but there was no cloud of dust, no glint of armour in the low sunlight, nothing indicating that someone followed their trail. She was worrying for nothing, wasn’t she?

Anders came back with wet hair and she went to clean herself of the dust and the sweat while he set up some wards for the night.

She kneeled before the creek’s water, relishing in the calming sound of its tinkling. Hands in the stream, she tried to regulate her breathing, suddenly very aware of the tension she bore in her shoulders, aware of the urgency she had felt the past days. She watched the water flow, listened to the sound it made, relished in its coolness against her skin. She splashed some on her face, calming, invigorating.

She loved the wilderness. The shade of the trees, the noises crickets made, the swaying of golden wheat fields under the breeze. The freedom to go off the path, to run simply because she wanted to.

She hated the wilderness. The giant spiders nesting in dark forests, the roads with hidden bandits, the places where the Veil had thinned and demons come through. The urge to survive, a constant presence at the back of her mind, needling her to listen, to watch, to hide.

And now her feet ached with walking, her shoulders were sore and by the way her cheeks burned, she was sure to be sunburned. When she was done washing, the sun had already hidden behind the highest peaks of the mountain and her shadow was barely visible on the ground. Worried that Anders might worry, she hurried back to their camp.

* * *

She found Anders sitting on the ground against the cliff next to an unlit campfire, hugging his knees, his head lowered. Any sense of peace she might have felt vanished, replaced by dreadful urgency. She heard him choke in the quiet of the evening. She ran to his side and crouched down next to him, hesitantly putting a hand on his trembling shoulder.

“Do you need anything?” She would have asked if he was alright, but the answer was plain as day. He lifted his head up, startled, not quite seeing her. His face was pale and clammy, his eyes wild, pupils dilated in terror. Coraline could not tell if the beads on his forehead were sweat or water from his hair. He choked on his own breath again, shaking.

“No- I’m fine,” he gasped. She watched him try to straighten up, fighting the panic, and then falling back down, his eyes unfocused.

“Of course you are. Look, I’ve got a thing for this, so, hum, stop me if you need to,” she told him before coating her hand with a thin sheet of ice, magic pooling around her, and moving it to Anders’ neck. His skin was burning hot and she let her magic pulse at a crawl, the ice forming and melting between them.

“Concentrate on the magic. Concentrate on the cold, breathe.” Under her hand, she could feel his heartbeat, wild and fast, resonating through him.

This was familiar in the worst way possible. Leliana before him had had those moments when memories of her time in Orlais overwhelmed her, Alistair his nightmares from the countless battles he had fought at her side, his shield raised for her. Before them, Neria had choked on her terror more times than Coraline could count, back in the dark corners of the Circle.

They were good people, all of them, undeserving of the anguish thrust upon them by an unjust world. She swallowed her anger at the thought, chiselled it into softness, and tried to help.

She wondered about her plans for supper aloud, in as casual a voice as she could manage. They still had some dried fish, maybe they could make a stew? She had never used dried fish in a stew before. See, this is why he should have let her run after that rabbit they had seen earlier. Yes, yes, she would have broken her neck on the rocky slopes trying to catch up to it, but at least dinner would not be a problem. If they found a good flat rock, maybe she could make flatbread the way they did in Tevinter. She still had some flour. Flatbread and salted fish and apples, that sounded good, didn’t it?

When she could not talk about food anymore without imagining pies and roast beef and orlesian crepes, she switched to telling him about the wonders of Rivain. There was a city built all on different levels, like a giant birthday cake. They had water systems to make little rivers on every level and there were luxuriant gardens everywhere. Of course, the city was in the middle of the forest, so it was very hard to get to. Had he ever seen a tiger before? Think giant cat, but more murderous.

As she ran out of stupid things to babble about, his pulse relaxed under her hand and his breathing slowed, falling in sync with the slow ebb and flow of her mana around him. Coraline kept up her spell, the ice forming and melting in rhythm against the nape of his neck, giving him something tangible to concentrate on. She waited for him to give any indication that his state had truly passed to move.

It came when he lifted up his head in a deep inhale, and she let the magic go, the ice melting one last time on her palm. She put her hand on his shoulder, wincing at the numbness of her frosted fingers.

“Better?”

“Yes- Sorry about that.” He was looking red-faced at the ground in front of him and sat up shakily. She held him steady, just in case.

“Don’t be, happens to everyone. Need some water? Anything?”

“I- Yes... Please.” She obliged and once she was certain that he would be fine -he was white and shaking, but that was only the exhaustion-, she rummaged through her travel pack to find her flour bag and her oil bottle. All her talk of food had made her impossibly hungry.

She mixed water, flour and oil to a paste, stealing glances at Anders. He was still pale, but seemed to have calmed down considerably. She was unsure what else to do, the situation both too familiar and too foreign.

“Do you want to talk about it?” She ended up asking, wincing at the poorness of her opening. He did not answer, but from the way he turned away from her, she knew he had hear her. “At least tell me how to help if it happens again.”

“Your ice spell… I’ve felt you cast it before.” His voice was tinged with exhaustion.

She blushed crimson but did her best to ignore the knot in her stomach and all the instincts telling her to _shut up_, because at least now, Anders was talking. “I find ice calming,” she shrugged non-committally.

“Do you cast it often?” His question was loaded, and the frequency of her casting was not quite what he was asking about.

“As often as I need to,” she said, before admitting, “more frequently in the wild.” She busied herself heating up the stone she had found to hide her embarrassment. She did not need to, considering Anders’ eyes were still fixed on a pebble in front of him.

“It’s effective,” he half-whispered. “It would be better if the pulsing was faster at the beginning. And you don’t have to talk. Not that I don’t like your voice or anything, just-”

“You don’t have to give me reasons, I get it. I just want to help.”

“I used to deal with this better,” he said, apologizing again. “I’ve less control over… myself, since Justice died. He helped with this stuff.”

“I’m sorry. He was your friend.”

“He was me.”

Coraline thought about it for a second. “The two aren’t mutually exclusive.”

Anders stayed silent while she made dinner. When he spoke again, a plate in his hands, his voice was barely above a whisper. “You don't have to be so nice to me.”

She threw a glance at him; he was staring at the fire, seemingly resolute to _not _look at her. Anger took her at the throat once more; if the world was not going to be kind to him, _she_ would be. “Well, though luck, because I'm not planning on stopping,” she chuckled, steel underneath the laughter. She handed him a piece of fried bread and some honey.

Coraline, for the second time since she had met Anders, woke up before him. His episode the previous evening had clearly exhausted him, and even though the sun was already rising, she elected to let him sleep it off. The threat of potential Templars yet lingered in her mind and she paced quietly away from Anders’ sleeping form, trying to figure out if anyone was hunting them. She knew that they should keep moving, cross the border as soon as possible and pass into the thick mountainous forest that lied on the coast of the Venefication Sea. They could come back down South to the coastal cities of Rivain from the East, avoiding any Templars that may be looking for them. But Anders was still sleeping soundly and she did not have the heart to rouse him. If the circles under his eyes were any indication, he needed the rest far more than they needed to run away.

Anders woke up mid-morning to a prepared breakfast and packs made to go. Idle hands did not suit Coraline. They left soon after, Coraline anxious to catch up lost time, but careful not to make Anders feel like he had somehow done something wrong. You’re overthinking this, she told herself, to no avail. She kept looking over her shoulder for clouds of dust in the horizon.

No Templars.

* * *

They came upon a small group of travellers in the afternoon. Shaggy clothes, underfed and terrified, pointy ears, coming from the west. Tevinter. Coraline had them pegged for runaway slaves a mile away. Her first thought was that they should not stop, that the slaves would slow them down, with either conversation or begging -or a fight. Next to her, Anders acted like the shining beacon of compassion he was.

“We need to check if they’re alright,” he said, and she kicked herself. Of course they should. It was the right thing to do. And yet, Coraline still deemed it too high a risk.

But she could already see how the conversation would go if she spoke up.

“We’re already behind schedule,” she would object, calmly and rationally, making the clever choice. “For all we know, there’s already a bunch of Templars on our trail, we can’t afford the delay.”

Anders would be outraged, of course. He would be turning towards her with a shocked expression, like he could not believe she was so mean and so selfish. Ugh. He would probably say something like, “you’re kidding, right? Amell, they’re people!”

She would argue with actual, solid arguments instead of the well-meaning generalities Anders would go for. “Yes. And odds are they will die before they get anywhere -even if they do, they’ll probably be sold back into slavery as soon as they get there.”

After a point, she would try to defuse the situation, but Anders would ignore it. Not because he was combative, although he was, but because he would not even notice the peace offering. She had not known him to be especially subtle. So they would continue to argue, until she said something that crossed a line. She knew herself; Anders would somehow push her to say something just a little too vicious, and then he would look at her with hapless eyes and she would give up, and they would go help the slaves anyway.

Coraline shook her head. “… Fine, we’ll go see. But no magic.”

There were two women, a man, and a child, all in bad shape, and none spoke a word of Trade. Coraline had picked up some Tevene when she had been forced to visit Minrathous, so she translated what she could for Anders. He bandaged their feet, put a salve on the man’s injuries and when the kid tugged at her mother’s skirt asking for food, Coraline felt obligated to give them the last of their dates and some provisions.

Something about the child threw her off her balance. The eyes, maybe, or the fearful look. The clear bruise on his neck. The child thanked her for the food in a little voice, as did the woman behind him. She forced a smile through the sudden discomfort. Through gritted teeth, she managed to give them directions to Treviso in the South, telling them to look for the Twin Lamps.

There were people, nicer people than herself, who helped escapees there.

“I could have done more with magic.” Anders whined as soon as they left. Clearly, complaining was more important than giving her the cold shoulder.

The hair. It had been the hair. That little elven boy had the same haircut -Void, the same hair colour- Neria had once had. The realization hit Coraline like lightning, leaving her breathless for a second. Quickly, she pushed all her emotions down and willed her voice not to shake. “They’re Tevinter_ slaves_, Anders. They’re afraid of magic, that comes with the title.”

“I know that. But I could have healed them, show them that they need not fear-”

Maker, Anders was annoying. “Right. You’re going to solve a lifetime of terror in three seconds. Anders, the miracle man.”

“I’m just saying, it could have been a start.”

“With Templars probably on our trail, too. That’s just begging for the gallows -magic or otherwise, at this point.”

“No need to exaggerate,” he mumbled.

The memories that flooded her head prevented her for thinking clearly, but she argued her point nonetheless. “I’m not. What do you think happens if we get caught? Odds are I’m sent to Aeonar and you to the gibbet!”

“Oh, look at you, caring about my well-being.”

She snapped, a headache pulsing at her temples. “Of course I care! I conscripted you! And, I’m the one who introduced you to Justice, remember? I’m about half the reason I found you half-dead in a cave a few weeks ago.”

“You overestimate yourself,” he jested. “I’m perfectly capable of making bad choices on my own, you know.”

“That’s not the point! The point is, there’s Templars looking for us and-”

He cut her off. “You know, they’re just people. Without a phylactery, they’re almost harmless. And it’s been days already, we would have seen something if any of them pursued us, trust me. I’ve ran away enough times to know when they’re closing in.”

Coraline had never had to run away from Templars before, protected by the Order. She had only fought them twice, helping Jowan escape and storming the Tower after Uldred’s rebellion. She had been unsuccessful the first time and Alistair had shouldered most of the work the second. Templars’ abilities scared her so much that she had learned to wield daggers, just in case she would one day face one magicless.

And even though, like everyone else in the history of the world, she hated to admit she was wrong, she had to accept that if Anders, the man who had escaped the Circle half a dozen times, who had managed to avoid capture for six years in Kirkwall, who knew how Templars operated, said that they were in little danger, then it was probably true.

Still, she could not resist mumbling under her breath, “well, you kept getting caught, so you can’t have been that great at it.”

Anders turned back towards her, probably to say something caustic, but seemed to think better of it. “Are you alright?” he asked instead, concern etched on his features. Apparently, her burning cheeks and sweaty forehead could not be attributed to the sun.

“Yes, I’m fine.”

He narrowed his eyes but did not press the matter. She breathed slowly, concentrating on putting one feet in front of the other. Simple things. No memories.

* * *

By the time evening rolled around, Coraline was so deep in thought that Anders took him upon himself to cook dinner. They had made camp on a little hill, at the edge of the last plain before the frontier. They would cross into Rivain the next day. He could not wait to be out of this desert. The nights here were alive with the sound of distant predators, and even though Coraline had assured him hyenas would not attack them, he was still uneasy. Their laughter was grating to his ears, making his nightmares more vivid than they ever needed to be.

Living with Justice had been hard at times, but when the terror came, he had been a pillar, taking control until Anders felt safe again. He had had habits, before. Focusing on relaxing one muscle at a time, walking around, casting some spells he had created for the occasion. With Justice, he had not had need of these in such a long time that this last incident had taken him completely by surprise. Coraline had seemed… practised. She had smelled of sandalwood and jasmine and fresh moss, which had been far more distracting than her voice, and that spell of hers had been terribly clever.

And then, he remembered seeing her stagger suddenly, her cheeks flushed, her eyes vacant, and the way she had been quiet all day, unfocused. He stirred his stew, perfumed with some wild berries and leaves. They had given all their potatoes to the runaways. He turned to announce that dinner was ready when he saw that she was asleep. He went over to her and arranged her cape so the chill wind would not wake her.

He ate alone, going over the travel book he had bought in Seleny. It had some descriptions of the main cities in Rivain, along with a number of sentences in rivaini and in Trade. A lot of the vocabulary would only be useful if he wanted to visit the brothel, but after reading and re-reading the book, he was sure he knew enough rivaini to find his way in local marketplaces. He really should have asked Isabela to teach him in Kirkwall. A pang of hurt cursed through his heart at the memory of the pirate captain. He wondered if she was still alive; if she had found a ship and finally left that cursed city behind.

Coraline was still asleep when he lied down for the night, which worried him. She never slept before him.

The next morning, he woke before her and prepared some breakfast, as had become their habit. He poked her with his staff when the porridge was ready, leaning over to reach her. She grumbled a sleepy ‘fuck off’ and he smirked. Everything was right again. He handed her a bowl when she emerged from under the cape, raking her hands through her hair futilely and yawning loudly.

“I’m so hungry!” She complained, already downing her breakfast. “I fell asleep yesterday, didn’t I?”

“You did. I cooked dinner all by myself.”

She snorted inelegantly. “I bet it tasted terrible. I’m glad I didn’t eat any.”

“Hey! Fereldan rabbit stew is a delicacy!”

“Yeah, right. Fereldans also invented porridge, which-” She stopped speaking, realizing she was holding a spoon full of said porridge inches from her open mouth. Anders held back a smile, waiting for her to come up with a new way to denigrate the traditional Fereldan breakfast. “Ew. Gross. Porridge is a fucking abomination. Honestly, that’s what Templars should be concerned about.”

“The proliferation of oats throughout the land?”

“Damn right. I’d rather eat an abomination than porridge,” she declared, all the while finishing her bowl, making grimaces as she ate.

“Great, now you’re making me wonder what they taste like.”

“Not as bland as porridge, that’s for sure.” Anders mustered a smile, relieved her earlier mood had passed; she seemed just as grumpy as any other morning.

They crossed into Rivain that day, and he even laughed at Coraline’s bad pun about thieves playing hide and seek.


	8. The Festival of Lights - Part I

“We’d need teachers, though, just like in the Circles,” Anders said, dreaming aloud of what a world without Chantry oversight might look like. They had just crossed into Rivain, which explained his new talkative mood. Even Coraline had let up, the threat of Templars quelled in her mind.

She snorted derisively, putting her book down, laying on her side lazily. Her feet ached from the walking, but they would soon be in Ayesleigh where she could rest. And pick up that damn manuscript. “Not like the Circles. Anything but that.” Anders raised a quizzical eyebrow, prompting her to explain. With a sigh, she did. “The Senior Enchanters are worse than demons.”

He smiled, barely a rise from the left corner of his mouth, the fire between them casting shadows on his face. “I know they’re all old and ugly, but that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?”

She rolled her eyes. “Demons, we know we’re not supposed to trust. The Enchanters are meant to protect us, teach us. Fuck, they basically raised me.”

“Well, yes. What am I missing?”

She rolled her eyes again, this time with the sort of annoyed trepidation that came when she talked about herself. “Do you remember Mildred? She must have been about your age.”

It took him a moment to put a face on the name. Short, a lovely arse, and a propensity for creation magic. Also, a blood mage. “She was a blood mage, I remember. They killed her, didn’t they?”

“But do you know _how _they knew? Because some Senior Enchanters kept putting banned books where she studied for her to find. I saw them being all shifty about it. They were supposed to teach her, and then they just went and- all it took was for her to open one of their books, and suddenly, oh no! Blood mage! Odds are she was never actually a blood mage and they just needed to get rid of her for whatever reason.”

Anders closed his eyes an instant and pinched the bridge of his nose. “They killed her.”

“Yes.”

“Over a situation they created.”

“Yes!” Coraline sounded more exasperated than triumphant, flinging her arms out wildly.

“Maker help us,” he sighed, his previous mood all but forgotten.

She hissed. “I’ll help myself! They did the same to Jowan, too. Kept leaving books around, and I kept rushing to find them before he did.” Anders raised an eyebrow. “I love him, but he’s not the brightest. That’s how we knew we needed to get him out before they made him Tranquil.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask, how did you get in the repository? I’ve never been able to figure out a way in.”

Coraline looked terribly peeved. “Jowan seduced a Chantry sister.”

There was a fleeting moment of silence as Anders digested this information. “You’re joking.”

She shook her head with a dramatic affect. “He didn’t even do it on purpose.”

“Jowan... Seduced someone?”

“I know, I know. I was shocked too.”

Anders’ mouth hung open. “I can’t believe I’ve never thought about doing that myself.”

“You’d probably have come around to it, eventually. You were quite_ inventive_ about your escape attempts yourself.”

He beamed with pride. “I was, wasn’t I?”

“You were sort of our little hero, back then. Like that time when you just grabbed your phylactery and smashed it, that was great.”

“Ah, yes, that.” Coraline did not notice the squaring of his jaw.

“Yeah! You were an inspiration, really.”

“Mmh. Didn’t really go far, but still.” He let out a chuckle. “Can’t believe you remember that.”

“Of course I do! I was, what, six or seven, maybe. They’d caught you and were dragging you back across the dining hall. And you just-” She mimed a swiping gesture “-stole it off Greagoir’s neck! We told stories about it for days.”

He laughed, and then he did not. “There was a line of Templars I needed to get through, and I just couldn’t-” Kill them, she finished for him. Anders had not been a killer when they had met in Amaranthine. She knew that very well, because she had been the one to fashion him into one. And even then, he had preferred his role as healer.

She wondered, again, how much of a part she had played in making Anders the man he was now, who slaughtered bandits and blew up Chantries. The thought tasted sour and it must have showed on her face, because even Anders picked up on it.

“The Grey Wardens were sort of a blessing, really. I was completely defenceless before I met the lot of you.”

Coraline grimaced. “Yes, lucky you.”

* * *

What hit Anders first in Ayesleigh were the colours; Fereldans dressed in modest (if not somber) tones, and Kirkwall had been drab at best, especially in Lowtown where he had spent most of his time. But here in the small port city, red and gold banners and streamers flew in the sea breeze, houses were painted in loud tones of blues and whites and yellows, and people wore shahs of vibrant silks, splashed with yellows and reds and some shades he had never before seen on garments.

It was wonderful.

It was exhausting.

The noise of the city jammed up his ears, after weeks of having only Coraline around. The smells of spices and fishes and liquor overpowered his nose, and there was simply  _ so much _ to see. He kept looking around wildly, unable to decide on what to focus on first. Coraline, royally unbothered, led him through the busy streets to what seemed to be a rather nice neighbourhood. Restaurants lined the streets, filling the air with scents of roast mutton and fish and all the spices he only knew because Coraline had forced him to try them. The outdoor seating, which had spilled onto the street so much they had to zigzag between tables, was brimming with customers, who spoke loudly and laughed louder.

Andraste be praised, there was even a bakery, smelling of butter and, oh, more butter. He sniffed the air. Was that apple pie?

Coraline sat him down in a restaurant, plonked a cup of tea in front of him and left to find them rooms for the night, telling him to stay put. He let her, too busy looking around to protest being treated like a child. On the walls hanged colourful tapestries telling old folk stories, on every wooden chair was a cushion of different colour, beautifully embroidered with shining thread, and the smell of peppermint floated in the air. The other customers seemed to all be locals, and many were smoking from strange long pipes they shared around. He sipped his tea, trying his ear to the new language.

Outside, some musician was playing a song on an instrument he had never heard before.

“Mage, huh?” Someone asked in Trade on his right. He whirled around, the music forgotten. A tall, dark-skinned man dressed in long yellow robes was looking straight at him. He had a pipe in one hand and a book in the other. Anders, of course, saw none of that. He only saw the large curved knife in the man’s belt.

How had the man known? He almost smacked himself when he realized he had his staff with him. Stupid of him to even wonder. He had brought his staff into the city! He had been so tired, and- Oh, Maker, this was going to end badly- Why didn’t Coraline remind him to hide it?

Before he could panic thoroughly, the man opened his mouth again. “Mind if I join you?”

Anders blinked twice, a hand already clasped around his only weapon, before seeing the man’s book and the man’s pipe and deciding he might not in fact be a threat. Might. “Sure,” he said at last, moving his travel bag from the cushion next to him.

“What brings a Southerner to Ayesleigh? Tired of the weather?” The man smiled at his own joke, his teeth a bright flash of white.

His accent in Trade was so thick Anders did not understand all the words, but still got the idea of it. “Something like that.”

“Ah, Fereldan, he? I can recognize any accents. M’a trader myself, see. Been all over the Continent, back in the day.”

“You don’t travel anymore?” Anders’ hand was still on his staff and he uncrossed his legs, ready to run away from this surrealist conversation at the first sign of trouble.

“Only round the ol’ country. Cold makes my joint-pains worse.”

Unable to stop himself and despite thinking it was a horrible idea, Anders had to ask, bluntly. “Does it not bother you that I am a mage?”

The man shrugged. “Ma daughter’s a mage too. Did you see the bakery on market street? With the big pink sign? Piece o’ Cake, it’s called.”

Anders answered without thinking, because this conversation made no sense, so, really, what was the point? “I did, actually.”

“That’s hers.” The man mistook Anders’ surprised expression for amusement. “Don’t worry, her cakes are better than her puns.”

Anders managed a thoroughly confused smile.

Four hours later, he was leaving A Piece of Cake, his belly full of pastries and his smile still confused.

It took him the better part of the next hour to find Coraline, strolling through the afternoon market.

“I found us a room, by the way. Only one, though,” she said when he reached her. He wondered if she had even looked for him, considering how nonchalantly she was now examining stalls of jewellery and trinkets.

“Only one? If you wanted to get me alone somewhere, you simply had to ask.”

She ignored him. “It’s the Festival of Lights, all the inns in town are already packed with travellers. Oh, and before I forget: I had to lend your services to the innkeeper’s husband. He’s got back pains that need to be checked up.”

“My services, huh?”

She crossed her arms. “It was the only way we were getting that room. It’s either that or we sleep outside the gates tonight.”

“Who am I to refuse a man in need?”

“That’s the spirit.”

When he told her of his encounter, she let out a long-suffering sigh. “Let me summarize. You met a strange man in a strange place and decided that, because he offered you cake, he was trustworthy?”

“That’s not-”

“Whatever. Next time, leave a note to the barkeep so I don’t think you’re dead for two hours.”

“Oh, it’s adorable, you were worried.”

The look she threw him was scathing, but she did not deny it. Anders followed her to the inn with a new spring in his step.

* * *

While Anders was given_ tea and croissants_, Coraline had been otherwise occupied, stealing away to the docks, checking if anyone in the city was looking for her. She had friendly relations with the local crime syndicate, which meant the only thing she needed to worry about were the couple of parties interested in the manuscript. Her search came up empty, but she got a meeting place to get said manuscript: that very night, in an ill-famed pub everyone simply called ‘That Hole next to the Winking Mare’ because the sign on the front door had been lost ages ago.

She had originally planned on getting it and getting out of the city immediately to -well. She was starting to realize why Zevran was so eager to play guide in Antiva anytime she met him there. She had spent almost two years in Rivain, around this very city, while looking for a cure to the Calling; she had made some habits, in a way, and with Anders here, she could not wait to show him the fireworks on the last day of the festival, or take him to the bakery that made the best muffins in all the land, or introduce him to Alonzo the winemaker and the Rivaini magic shops, which were so much better than any magic emporiums back South.

That meant she needed a room to stay in the city, even though the inns were packed with revellers and merchants come to the city for the festival, so she called in a few favours from Anesu, an innkeeper she had met back then. Anesu, shrewd businesswoman, managed to extract from her the promise that she would pay for her husband’s treatment for his painful leg.

Coraline, of course, did not intend on paying anything to anyone. She had Anders for healing purposes.

Speaking of Anders. She had left him in the safest part of the whole city before leaving on her errands, and yet, she had still managed to lose him. She had panicked a little; between pirates, thieves, the occasional slave merchant, and maybe that Tevinter noble that was still trying to get to the manuscript before her, odds were high that Anders was being cut into little pieces at the very same time she was helplessly running around town looking for him.

But no. He had been having  _ tea and croissants _ . 

She had been in the process of getting information out of a jewellery seller when he had found her, which left her mildly peeved. At least, the inn was as lovely as she remembered, tucked away at the end of a cobbled street, squeezed between a clothier and a barber. As soon as they arrived, Anesu, a short woman in a colourful apron and headscarf, swept her healer away to meet her husband. The innkeeper’s daughter approached Coraline in the same movement.

“My mother says you are a friend of Zevran. Do you have any news from him?”

Ah, yes. These people thought she was a common adventurer, although one with interesting connections. The stories of the Fifth Blight had seldom spread here, but Rivaini held the Grey Wardens in high esteem. When she had last been here, she had needed to keep a low profile, hence the deception. She did not look like the board and sword warrior people thought of when they heard the name ‘Grey Warden’, nor like a Circle mage, tripping over long robes and keeping a staff at hand. She could pass for an adventurer down on her luck, even without a sword or a bow at her side; the pink scar on her jaw, travel cape, and rugged look were enough deceive most onlookers. Her magic did not even mark her as an apostate here, the word only carrying meaning in Andrastian lands.

“Last time we spoke, he was in good health,” she said as non-committally as one could. She had never met Anesu’s daughter and was not about to take any risks. For all she knew, the girl had some Crow friends.

The girl laughed. “We met last year, right during the festival. I was hoping to get word to him.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know where he is.” The girl shrugged.

“Well, if you see him somewhere, could you tell him I’m getting married on Summerday? He introduced me to my betrothed, and I’d like him to be here for the ceremony.”

Coraline saw no lie in her words, but played it safe anyway.

“I will. And well, who knows? Maybe he’ll pass by here before then.”

“Thanks! I’m Anaya, by the way.”

“Corabella, Bella for short. And congratulations on the engagement.” Coraline made a note to warn Anders about her old pseudonym -carefully chosen so that if anyone called her ‘Cora’ by accident, it would not raise any suspicions. Maybe she was a little too careful sometimes.

“Anaya, are you bothering our guest?” The innkeeper returned, Anders at her side.

“No, mama. We were only discussing a mutual friend.” Anaya had the nerve to wink at her from the side. Coraline cleared her throat.

“I take it he did a decent job with your husband’s leg?”

This prompted Anesu to start gushing about Anders’ healing prowess, while Anaya rolled her eyes and the healer smirked proudly at Coraline. She glared at him. Anaya cut off her mother, who was running out of superlatives anyway. “I’ll show you to your room,” she called to them, prompting them to follow her to the last floor of the inn, the innkeeper still thanking Anders warmly for his services at the bottom of the stairs.

The room was spacious, even boasting a small sofa and a pile of books (a rarity in merchants’ inns nowadays). The window had a high railing and gave onto a small courtyard, letting light stream through the half-closed blinds. There was only one bed.

“I claim the bed,” she announced as soon as they entered.

“Hey! Not fair.”

She crossed her arms. “I said it first, I get to sleep in it.”

“Without my healing talents, we wouldn’t have a bed to sleep in at all,” Anders pointed out, still feeling high from the innkeeper’s praise.

“Without me finding the inn in the first place, you wouldn’t have had the opportunity to show off-”

“Alright, alright.” Anders rose his hands defensively, laughter in his voice. “I’ll take the- he looked around- sofa, I guess.”

“Excellent,” Coraline said, ignoring his kicked-puppy eyes.

* * *

Anders stayed in to ‘read a book’ (she was sure it was a metaphor, but for what exactly, she could not tell), while Coraline went off to ‘meet up with some old friends’.

She had no difficulty getting to That Hole unnoticed, swarms of party-goers filling the streets, illuminated by coloured lanterns. Next to it in front of the Winking Mare, a couple of half-naked prostitutes tried to entice men and women to come inside. The Hole had few patrons, only regulars, meaning sailors and thieves, and, if she guessed correctly, a table of lyrium smugglers. Respectable company usually avoided the place, if only because they watered down the ale. The owner had not bothered decorating for the Festival.

“’Evening,” she greeted as she plumped down on a chair opposite a man in cape and hood in the darkest corner of the room.

“Shh. Not so loud.” His voice was pleasantly deep, tinged with an Antivan accent. He sounded educated, unlike herself who had put on a very lower class affect.

“Fuck’s sake. Why’s it always got to be cloak and dagger with you lot? Lookit you. You’re a damn ste-ri-o-type is what you are.” Her accent was all over the place, a bit of Fereldan, a bit of Nevarran, a lot of Antivan. It encouraged people to make their own (wrong) assumptions.

“Do you even know what that means?”

She put on a frown, then a blush. “Whot’ver. Got the stuff?”

“Do you have the money?”

“Shhsh. ‘Course. I’m no thief.”

She guessed more than saw him raise a dubitative eyebrow under the hood. “Show me.”

She rolled her eyes ostentatiously and grabbed the heavy bag of coins from her belt. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the Wicked Grace players -a greasy sailor and two rough-looking elves, definitely lyrium smugglers- had stopped playing. Great. She placed the bag on the table, keeping a hand on it.

“Where’s the merchandise?”

“Right here.” The manuscript. The ancient, never published, Tevene manuscript, Midnight Compendium. Written by Archon Almadrius himself in the Ancient Age, or so the legends claimed. Said to have been burned by Andrastian faithful, or lost during the first Qunari invasion. In her reach. “Do you even how much this is worth?”

She shrugged, looking royally unconcerned. “Don’t know, don’t care. I’m paid to do the run, I do the run.” As far as the man was concerned, she was a lowly smuggled hired by some rich someone in Ferelden. The rich someone being her, of course.

“An attitude that will get you far in life, girl,” the man chuckled. He took the money and handed her the manuscript. Its cover was leather, Coraline guessed human (elven) skin. It felt lighter than it should for the wealth of knowledge it contained. “Oh, and I feel the professional need to warn you. The three-”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m no frickin’ amateur.” She mispronounced the word amateur to add some flair.

The man chucked again before gesturing for her to leave.

Coraline -Bella- made her way out nonchalantly, looking in between bored and slightly intoxicated. And as soon as she got out the door, she removed her cape, stuffing it in her bag with the manuscript. They would be looking for a caped thief.

She blended in the crowd of partygoers, quickly moving away from the pub and the whorehouse, grabbing a handful of churros and a spark stick to look more the part. The three men had followed her out, and she saw them searching around while she bought a blue scarf from a street seller and immediately put in on her head, hiding her distinctive blonde hair. They were looking for someone looking shifty, so she made herself look as local as possible, chatting with a flirty stranger first chance she got.

It took her a dozen of minutes, but she was sure she lost them in the large night market on the Plaza. Reassured, she headed back towards the inn, only wanting to put her feet down. Ideally, she would spend the night perusing the old tome, but she would have to get rid of Anders first. Under no circumstances was she letting him get a look at the Compendium -he was still a Circle mage, after all.

“Bella!”

She turned at the sound. Alonzo, Antivan wine merchant and collector of miniature trees, was waving at her from the front porch of his wine shop in the way only Antivans can, full bodied and somehow loud. She waved back just as loudly.

“We’re wine tasting! New shipment from the Weirs. The Tignanello estate!”

Well. She could hardly say no.

She came back to the room she shared with Anders far into the night, more than a little tipsy, and hoping dearly that he was already asleep. He was not, lounging on  _ her _ bed reading one of the inn’s books, awake enough to see her trip on the rug.

He glanced up at her from his book. “Had fun?”

She had to blink to make the room stop spinning. “Yeesh.” Outside, music was still playing, loud and joyous through the opened window. Coraline let herself flop on the bed, face in the covers, missing Anders’ knees by a hair.

He put down his book. “I can see that. How much did you drink?”

“Many. Much,” she mumbled from the sheets. “Several?” In the manner of drunks everywhere, she sat up suddenly, losing and regaining her balance. “… The Tignaniel. Tignello. Tigngango? Fuck.” She wrinkled her nose, trying her hardest to remember the spelling and failing miserably.

Anders tried to listen to her incoherent monologue, quickly giving up when she started rambling in Antivan -or what sounded marginally like Antivan. He waited for her to calm down, which she did after a while, crashing back down on the bed.

“Everything good?” he asked as he watched her grasp at the air above her head.

“M’trying to catch the light.”

“Good luck with that.” He picked up his book and resumed his reading.

It was the least interesting thing he had ever had the displeasure to read, a long treatise on the history of fencing. Unfortunately, apart from ‘Common phrases in Rivaini’ that he knew almost by heart, it was the only book written in a language he could read. He managed to get through another gruelling chapter, half-listening to Coraline’s slow breathing.

“Why Kirkwall?”

He glanced at Coraline, sprawled inelegantly at his feet, her eyes closed. “What?”

“After you left the Wardens. Why go to Kirkwall of all places?”

“Why does it matter?”

“It doesn’t. You don’t even have to answer.”

Anders put down his book on the bedside table carefully. “I was trying to save a friend.”

“Did you?”

Outside, the music had calmed somewhat, guitars notes still reaching them. The breeze brought to him the smell of ale and smoke. “No.”

“M’ sorry,” she said. Anders listened to the party-goers outside. A dull ache settled comfortably in his heart, an old longing for a life he never led.

Coraline interrupted his sad musings. “What’s the book?”

“Do you ever stop asking questions?”

“Not if you keep answering them.”

A shadow of a smile passed on his lips. “It’s a treatise about swordplay.”

“That’s nice. Swordplay’s fun.”

“No, it’s really not. It just happened to be there.”

“Hey, don’t dig on swordplay. It’s a perfectly good hobby.”

Anders scoffed. “Like you’ve ever held a greatsword before.”

“Huh. I’m sure I’ve held more greatswords than you in my life.”

“What? That’s ridic-” Anders cut himself off, suddenly realizing they were having two wildly different conversations. “Get your head out of the gutter, the book is about actual fencing!”

She propped herself up on her elbow to look at him. “It is? You’ve got to be kidding.” He handed her the book, which she quickly surveyed. “Huh. I thought it was a dirty play or something. I can’t believe you didn’t fall asleep reading this… How far along did you get?”

“Chapter 6: Orlesian fencing etiquette in the first half of the Storm Century.”

She laughed. “Wait ‘til you get to the good part: Orlesian fencing etiquette in the second half of the Storm Century. Now that’s just… life-changing.”

“As in, it will kill me from boredom?”

She giggled -giggled. Like a damn courtesan or one of his patients, usually married women, that kept coming back to his clinic for the most inane reasons. He wished he had a way to bottle the moment in order to embarrass her for the rest of her life. Giggled. She swayed a little, losing her balance again. “Any interesting rules I should know?”

“Always make them breakfast the morning after.” She laughed again, shaking her head like _he_ was the one who had started it. “Any more questions?”

“Why do noses run but feet smell?”, came her quick-fired retort. He should not be surprised that even hammered, she still managed to be snarky.

“Andraste save me, you got your sense of humour from Oghren.”

She grinned proudly. “You’re damn right I did, and I’m hilarious.”

Minutes later, she was yawning. Anders threw her the extra blanket provided by Anaya and closed the window. The sounds of the street all but vanished and Coraline drifted off to sleep gently, buried under the blanket. Anders sat back on the bed, wondering whether to resume his reading or not. It would probably be a funnier read if he took every other word as innuendo.

From the human-shaped blanket near his feet came a mumble. “Get off my bed.”

“Make me.” He settled against the pillows and closed his eyes.

* * *

Anders had read so many contraband romance novels back in the Circle that he almost expected Coraline to be in his arms when he woke up. He thought about it for two seconds before deciding it would not have made any sense anyway. Still, it would have been nice, even if more out of a general sense of romanticism and a long-held need for closeness than any desire for her.

Instead he woke up with his feet on what he assumed was her face, as she was sleeping in foetal position in the middle of the bed. He kicked the blanket pile gently, drawing a groan from it.

He kicked it a little harder, earning a grouchy “fuck you” from the pile.


	9. The Festival Of Lights - Part II

“What now?”

Coraline glared at him and kept rubbing her hair. “My hair smells like feet,” she whined.

“No it doesn’t, I barely touched it. And I bathed yesterday.”

“Like old cheese and beer.”

“I think that’s just your natural smell.” She blew a raspberry at him. “Oh, very mature.”

“Give me two hours to think of a comeback, you’ll see. I’ve got too much of a headache to think right now.”

“Is that what we’re calling hangovers now?”

She glared at him some more. Truly, his idea for waking her up had been inspired; she had squealed like a frightened Chantry sister when she had noticed his foot two inches from her nose, and he was planning on mocking her for it at least until supper.

“You’re a healer, fix it,” she demanded. Apparently, the Hero of Ferelden, Commander of the Grey and all-around respected war hero, resorted to acting like a spoiled little girl when she was hungover. Anders sniggered.

“Healing is a noble art, a precise discipline-”

“Please!” Her tone was the very opposite of pleading.

He crossed his arms. “You insulted my feet.”

She threw her arms up in the air. “Fine! Your feet smell divine and I am blessed to be in their presence.”

“No need to exaggerate.”

“They are the sunshine of my days, the water to my crops, the salt to my supper-”

“Alright, alright. Come here.”

She obeyed, still rubbing her temples, coming to stand inches from him. He had never noticed how short she was; he had a head on her. She was barefoot- maybe her shoes had heels he had not noticed.

“Well?” she demanded, already fidgeting.

He shook himself out of his thoughts and put his hands on either side of her face. “Stand still for just one minute, will you?”

“My head hurts,” she whined. He rolled his eyes and got to work, mana slowly pouring out of him, curing her intoxication by purifying the alcohol out of her bloodstream. He could not help but smile proudly at his work when she let out a half-audible sigh of relief.

“Wow. You’re so much better at this than Wynne.”

He chuckled and let his hands slip from her face, resisting the sudden urge to mess with her hair. “I am indeed the best.”

She groaned. “Come on, breakfast is waiting. We need to get downstairs while your head can still fit through the door.”

Half an hour later, he was watching her stuff her face with far too many honeyed rolls and small cakes for anyone. He would have commented on it, but he had just devoured a giant bowl of date pudding himself, not to mention half a pot of ‘coffee’ and cream.

“Uurgh, cold,” Coraline grimaced as she drank from her teacup. For some reason, she had turned her nose at coffee, commenting that she ‘really didn’t need any of that’. She moved her hand and heated up her cup _magically and _Anders felt his blood freeze in his veins. Had she no sense of self-preservation? He swirled around, already on the lookout for Templar footsteps.

Her sniggering brought him back down. “Calm down, this is Rivain.” Indeed, none of the few patrons in the inn had taken notice of them. Or, well, of her. His panic-stricken figure had turned a few heads.

He took a deep breath as she took a swig of smoking hot tea, grabbing a small cake with her free hand. Between her and his adventure in A Piece Of Cake, this land was going to render him completely insane. “This is madness.”

She half-smiled, in that almost-mocking way he was getting far too often from her. “Isn’t it what you’re fighting for? You know, mages as people and all that?”

“Well, yes- I’m just- not used to not being careful, I guess.”

“Oh, you should still be careful. This is a small town. It’s not like that in Dairsmuid -all the nobles there are Andrastian now.”

“Hey, just because they believe in the Maker doesn’t mean they don’t see us as people.”

Coraline let out a small laugh, until she realized he was not joking and almost strangled herself with her pastry. Anders waited until she was done coughing. “Seriously?” She fanned herself with her hand, red from her coughing. “'Magic is meant to serve man, never to rule over him. Mages shall find no rest in this world or beyond, foul and corrupt are they.' That last one is a bit on the nose, even for them.” Anders found himself taken aback by her causticity. She was usually more measured than this.

“It’s just the transfigurations,” he countered, “and you’re taking the verses out of context, it’s meant to be about the first magisters-”

“Ah! You think people make a difference between them and us? Magic is magic, and the Chantry had been spewing its dogshit for centuries. Even here.” She took a deep breath, seemed to change her mind, shrugged, and grabbed another small cake.

“I’ll be the first to admit the Chantry has made mistakes, but it can do better. And you can’t condemn every faithful simply because of a few verses.”

He expected her to argue, most likely about the Chantry’s ‘mistakes’. Instead, she narrowed her eyes and put back the piece of cake she was holding on her plate, a blank expression on her face he was starting to be quite familiar with. “You want to reform the Chantry.”

“Well, yes. I thought me, you know, -he lowered his voice conspiratorially- blowing up the one in Kirkwall made that obvious.”

She joined her hands under her chin, pondering, cautious. Calculating. “I thought you were making a statement _ against _it.”

“I was. Against what it currently is, and for what it could be.”

She seemed to weigh her next words carefully. “That’s very noble,” said her mouth. “You’re a moron,” said the rest of her, subtly enough that Anders was sure he would have missed had he not been travelling with her for weeks.

Of course, he immediately called her out on it. “If you think that’s stupid, you can just say so.”

She blinked in surprise before dropping the act. “That’s stupid,” she sneered.

“Thanks for the honesty, I guess.”

“You’re welcome.”

Anders stared dumbly as Coraline swallowed yet another small cake. He thought about asking her why reforming the Chantry seemed such a ridiculous idea, but pride kept him from opening his mouth. Just as he was about to make up an excuse and leave, she spoke up. “I’m sorry, that was rude. Brioche?”

He looked at the peace offering in her hand and the sheepish smile on her face in turn, his mind already made up. “How are you still hungry? Nevermind. Apology accepted.”

Her smile turned as bright as a blazing Chantry and Anders forgot his questions entirely. When he remembered, she was already partway through telling him about their plans for the day, which included lunch at The Clam Hammer (a tavern near the port that specialized in shellfish) and a visit to a ‘real magic shop’, whatever that was.

Minutes later, they were outside, where the sky was cloudless and the streets smelled of beer, courtesy of last night’s party-goers. Coraline, seemingly determined to ignore their disagreement, played guide, which meant that Anders got an accelerated course in Rivaini politics, history, and architecture. He was not sure how- or when- she had learned all these things, but as long as she managed to make the Trade Agreement of Steel 85 interesting, he did not care.

* * *

She led him through the busy marketplaces and the small dirty alleyways, chatting away, until they arrived at the destination she had been gushing about for the largest part of the day. Magic shops in Andrastian countries were few and far in between, not to mention Circle-approved and Tranquil-run, which was code for boring and watched by Templars. Here, they were apparently staffed by alchemists or researchers who had not bent to Chantry law. Anders had thought he understood what she meant pretty well, but it took opening the door of one for him to truly grasp the concept.

The facade had seemed mundane enough, just a wooden sign depicting a seven pointed star and a square hanging above the door. Two small symbols, an eye and an upside down triangle, were painted on the wall besides the door, reminding him of the thieves’ cant in Kirkwall. Inside, however, was another story entirely.

The smell of incense hit him first, heavy with amber and myrrh. When his eyes acclimated to the darkness, Anders noticed that said darkness was due to a very large pile of book that almost completely obstructed the window. He was about to complain about this terrible way to store books (what about the dust? The humidity?) when his interest drifted to everything else, from the racks of dried herbs (was that Felandaris?) to the shelves of glowing potions to the tables cluttered with trinkets that oozed magical energy to the magic crystals hanging from the ceiling, providing the room with a dim blue light. Someone had unceremoniously stuck half a dozen staves and a Veilfire torch in an umbrella stand. A bright green parrot was cleaning his feathers, standing on top of a rack that seemed to only hold enchanted clothes.

“Anything I can help you with?” The shopkeeper peered at him from behind his counter and half-moon glasses. Crumbs fell out of his enormous beard as he spoke, half hidden behind a large leather-bound tome.

“Thank you, we’re just looking around.”

The shopkeeper looked him up and down and Anders had to resist the urge to take a step back towards Coraline. Magic hung heavy in the air. “If you want a blessing for your caravan or your ship, you need to make an appointment at least a day in advance.”

“Huh, no, thank you. Just browsing.”

“Faraai’s not here. He only does readings on mondays and thursdays between two and six, and on saturdays before elevensies.”

“Huh. Thanks.”

Coraline stepped out from behind Anders and casually conjured a small fire in her hand. “We’re the other kind of customer.”

The shopkeeper leaned back in his chair, the oppressing magic retreating somewhat, and picked his book back up. “Oh, right. Well, you know how this works. Spell books are in the back. We don’t carry anything on sex spells, and we don’t provide magic sex dolls either." He shook his head wearily. “Don’t touch anything on the shelf over there, and stay away from that mirror. Ask if you need anything in particular. And ignore the parrot.”

As if to illustrate the man’s advice, the parrot spoke up from his clothes rack. “Yourr motherr would be disappointed in yourr life choices.”

The merchant threw a bauble at the bird, who evaded it and laughed maniacally. Out of the corner of his eye, Anders saw Coraline stifle her own laughter behind her hand.

An hour later and Anders was still looking around, considering to simply set up a tent in the back and never leaving again.

Still they left, Anders’ small coin pouch emptied and his spirits high. His new cape had a rain-repellent enchantment on it and his new leather belt carved with protective sigils more space for poultices. Coraline had bought an Orlesian cooking book, which Anders found slightly odd. They were travelling, after all -why would she bother with the weight of a cooking book of all things?

* * *

They stopped to watch a play in a large marketplace after lunch, which Anders enjoyed greatly while Coraline complained about ‘historical inaccuracies’ under her breath. The Festival of Lights was back in full swing, most people now having woken up from their late night.

“Look!” Anders pointed at the fountain in the middle of the place, where two young girls were making small magelights dance around them, entertaining bystanders.

Coraline smiled at the display. “Probably apprentices from a village. It’s called the Festival of Lights, after all.”

Anders could hardly believe his eyes when a couple of children ran to the girls and tried to catch the magelights, jumping in the air, to the delight of their parents nearby. Coraline elbowed him.

“Stay like that and you’re going to catch flies,” she mocked gently. He closed his mouth.

“This is- I don’t know what to say.”

A band started playing behind them, barring him for hearing her response. She raised her voice to be heard over the song. “Come on, there’s a churros vendor over there, I can smell it from here.”

The two girls were still making children laugh and jump over by the fountain. He shook his head at her. “How are you still hungry?”

“It’s _churros_!” she exclaimed before disappearing into the crowd. Anders was not sure what churros were, but he would have bet his new cape that it was mostly sugar.

The afternoon ticked away quietly while they wandered around the city streets, lined with stalls and street performers. Anders regretted not having taken more care in his appearance when they came across a street artist. Coraline, sprinkles of sugar still at the corner of her mouth, did not let him draw her either, but they watched as the fortune teller tent came alive under the artist's charcoal.

She was going on about the increasing danger of using the Waking Seas trade routes (Isabela would be proud, he guessed) when Anders caught a glimpse of something far more dangerous than pirates.

They were passing along a quieter street, paved with white stones and surrounded by short colourful buildings. An old man opened the door of a blue house, stepping in the lazy sunlight. His hands were tanned, sun-spotted, and his boots had seen better days. Not quite knowing why, Anders stopped. The old man sat down on a low stone bench and lit a pipe, nodding lightly at a passer-by who returned the greeting. Something caught in Anders’ throat unexpectedly. The old man rested his head against the wall of his house, puffing on his pipe.

The mage tried to look away, but it was too late. Already, the scene changed, and it was now Anders, old and bearded and resting on a staff, that was sitting contentedly on the warm stone bench. It was not a street in front of it, but maybe a field, with a large oak tree, and a forest beyond.

Back in the street, Anders held back a breath, unable to tear himself away from the sudden dream. Someone came out of the house and beckoned him inside. Who they were did not matter, all that did was that they were smiling, and leaning on the door frame like they belonged there. Like _ he _belonged there.

“Anders?” Torn from his vision, he swivelled around to find Coraline looking up at him, a furrow in her brow. “Are you alright?”

His head felt dizzy. “Hum. Yes.” He tried to smile; his throat closed painfully. “I got distracted.”

Coraline looked past him, at the house, at the old man still sitting there, smoking his pipe. He could almost see her mind working, figuring things out behind her sharp eyes. A rush of shame swooped over him.

“Let’s go,” he said, a little too brusquely, before resuming their walk. She followed without comment.

* * *

The first thing Coraline did when Anders went back to the inn, pretexting a headache, was run to the docks. She had noticed, twice in the span of an afternoon, people following her and with Anders gone, she could take care of it discreetly.

She walked around like a tourist, handing a coin to the beggar at the corner of Hood Row, where all the shops were either pawn shops or fences. Usually both. It did not take long until two figures, steel at their hips, emerged from a corner. The passer-bys, quite used to this sort of thing, promptly disappeared in nearby passages as they realized they did not have to get involved.

Coraline did not see any other men, but they had been four different ones tailing her during the day. One human, two elves, and a dwarf, if she had the sizes right. The other two were probably standing in ambush behind her is case she tried to run.

She acted like it was just a common robbery, and not a planned attack. “Please, don’t hurt me! Take anything,” she said, voice wavering, before throwing the two men her bag of coin. The elf on the right took a greedy step towards it, only to be stopped by his human companion. He came closer and she recognized him as one of the men playing cards in the pub the previous night. At least, that made it simpler, knowing there was only one group of mercenaries chasing after her.

“We’re not looking for gold,” he said in what Coraline guessed was meant to be a menacing way. It was getting harder to tell, after killing several dragons, including one with the soul of an Old God, a number golems and two talking darkspawn. Her threat barometer was very thoroughly broken. She tried her best to look terrified while coming up with a plan.

“Please messere, I have nothing else.”

“The book,” the man intimated while the elf still eyed the gold strewn on the ground halfway between them. Coraline still had not seen or heard the other two.

“The book?”

“Yes, the book. The book!” The man started to lose patience. It was, after all, broad daylight and not even a back alley. This also happened to be a problem for Coraline, who could very well not kill four people in the middle of a street. She needed to get them to a less frequented place first.

“Oh! You mean my book. I have it here.” She reached slowly into her bag and grabbed the book. “If I give it to you, do you promise not to hurt me?”

The man shrugged. “We’re only paid to get the book.”

“Oh. Well, there you go then.” Coraline threw him the book, which he caught greedily.

She turned tail and ran, noticing the two figures shadowed behind a pile of barrels. Just a few seconds…

“What the fuck is this?” she heard the man yell, giving his companions the signal for a chase. She glanced behind her. Only three pursued, the dwarf and the second elf only a couple dozen meters behind, the human farther away, while the first elf had clearly decided on getting his payday early. A problem for later.

She turned into an actual backalley -dark, surrounded by unoccupied buildings, with only one way in -and one way out. Great place for a murder. The others seemed to think so too, because an arrow wheezed past her. She turned around and got the elf with an ice spell. Always get the archers first, there is no point trying to cast spells with an arrow in the throat.

She had a few seconds until the man caught up, which she used to cast a Paralysis Glyph on the dwarf. She needed to get the timing right to keep one alive. The ice spell was waning already...

The man came running, sword drawn. He hesitated at the scene, the glowing symbols holding the dwarf prisoner, the ice sheet covering the elf, the mage in the back... Coraline let herself slump slightly, heaving like she had made a great effort. Reassured that she was no danger anymore, he ran closer, and just before he passed his companions, she cast a Glyph of Repulsion on the dwarf.

The explosion resulting from the combination paralysed all three of them. She had about half a minute to kill them, probably less for the dwarf. She turned to the elf, his skin already hurt by the ice, and magically injected him with corrosive poison before taking a couple of steps back. He died quickly, and the spell bloomed, surging out like a bomb going off inside of him, killing the dwarf in the process and injuring the man. Coraline managed to raise a shield to protect herself from the bits of elf flowing her way just in time.

The paralysis ended and the man fell to the ground with a scream.

She kicked his sword away. “Who sent you?”

He kept screaming, falling over. She kicked him.

“Who sent you?”

“My Capt’n,” he managed to say, the drops of poison that had landed on him dissolving the skin on his face to the bone. Her spell had maybe been a little heavy-handed. “The Dancing Molly.”

“I’m going to need more than that if you want me to heal you.”

He made an effort to speak through the pain, which she appreciated. “Heard them talking. Hirer’s Magister Severus or something. Paid well.”

Now that she had confirmation of the name, Coraline sliced his throat with her dagger and dispelled all magic in the street. Odds were the local enforcement (nonexistent, but better safe than sorry) would assume it was a gang altercation involving poison and dwarven bombs.

She did not bother picking her ‘Just-Wed Cook Book’ book back. It had served its only purpose well enough, and its recipe for crème brulée included whole eggs, which frankly she did not stand for.

She still needed to take care of the last elf. One, he had her gold. Two, he had seen her with Anders, making him a target. She activated the tracking spell on her purse and followed it.

The Winking Mare. Unsurprising.

She ignored the girl at the entrance, made a sign to the bouncer that clearly marked her as part of the local crime syndicate (she was not) so that he would not interfere, and made a beeline for the right room before the spell dissipated.

Her thief was occupied, his back to her, and she gestured to the lady to keep going and ignore her, before stepping forward and digging her dagger into the elf’s back, striking at his heart.

Coraline discarded the body to the side.

“Hey! He was a good customer!”

“Stole from someone he shouldn’t have. Sorry.” She grabbed her purse back from the man’s trousers, oddly well folded on the chair, and gave the woman a generous amount of coin. “For his time, and,” she gestured at the blood staining the woman’s bed and the body on the floor, “that.”

The lady seemed about to protest before counting the money. “Fine. See with Miss Lulu to get the body removed.”

* * *

Not that Coraline was not good company, but, just this once, Anders was relieved to be alone. It was a rare enough occasion that it surprised even him; he had never enjoyed solitude, after all. Still, he needed a moment to think.

Sitting on the windowsill of their room in the inn, he let his thoughts drift back to the image of himself, old and bearded and peaceful, sitting on a stone bench in the golden light of the afternoon. The dream was clouded with shame; how could he be so selfish? A lizard approached, walking on the wall next to him.

It stopped to bask in the last rays of sunlight. Anders let his head rest on the warm wall, allowing himself a few moments of hope. Maybe one day...

He sighed, his dream already marred by the shadows of reality.

“What am I doing?” he asked the lizard.

“How should I know?” the lizard answered. Anders blinked, before realizing that the lizard’s voice was incredibly like Coraline’s, and, after checking, that said woman was standing at the door, head cocked in bewilderment. “Are you talking to a lizard?”

“No, of course no. That’s ridiculous.” He tried to hide his embarrassment with an eye roll. It did not work.

“Is it a magic lizard?”

“What? No- I mean, I don’t think so.” Anders eyed the lizard suspiciously. The lizard looked back.

“Why are you talking to it, then?”

“I’m not-” He sighed. “Whatever.”

Coraline settled herself on the bed, adjusting the pillows, forcing him to turn his head to look at her.

“Are you alright? How’s the headache?”

Anders swallowed. In the courtyard below, he could see an Orlesian merchant loosing at Wicked Grace. “I’m fine.” The Orlesian merchant threw down his last cards and stomped away from the table, leaving the other players smirking in victory.

Behind him, Coraline snorted audibly. “I’m usually the one doing that. You’re not very good at it.”

Anders turned to face her, frowning. “What?”

“If you want to lie, you need to get better at it. I mean,” she waved her hand in his general direction, “come on.”

“I wasn’t-”

“Let’s start over. Are you alright?”

This time, he got caught in her stare, forcing him to swallow his lie. “Not really.”

“Do you want to talk about it? I’m about half as good a listener as the lizard.”

That drew a smile from him. “Not really.”

In the courtyard below, a handful of children were playing blind man’s bluff. Anders decided it was easier to observe them than to look back at Coraline, whose sharp eyes saw far too much. A catastrophe was narrowly avoided when two of them collided with Anaya, who was bringing ales on a large platter.

“Is it about the old man near that street with the lanterns?”

Of course she had noticed. Anders felt a rush of annoyance run through him. Outside, one of the kids was hiding behind a large plant which he was pretty sure that was considered cheating. “For a moment there, I could just imagine it. Living here, with a house, a garden, a baker next door who knows my name.” He gritted his teeth, pushing the tears back, his head resolutely turned away from her. This was all so stupid.

“Why is this bad?”

His laughter rang hollow. “Mages are dying. They are being raped and murdered, and I’m looking at real estate. I should- I should be helping.”

Only silence answered him, condemning his actions and his thoughts. He did not dare look at her; he did not need to see the judgement in her eyes.

“You are not a spirit, Anders. You can’t live on ideals alone.” He heard a rush of fabric and felt her come lean on the wall next to him. “Justice and freedom and peace are all lovely, but we need more than just that. We need to feel like life is worth living, because at the end of the day, that’s what gets us up in the morning.” He sniffed. She continued. “So remember the house, and the garden, and your baker, because that’s what will keep you going when you go back South.”

“_When_ I go back?”

“You’re...” She waved her hand vaguely in his direction, sighing. “You. Breaking mages out of the Gallows, arguing over politics every chance you get. You couldn’t stay here if you tried.”

He turned to look at her, finding her far more sure of him that he had ever been. “You believe that.”

She shrugged. “It takes a special kind of person to attract a spirit of Justice.”

“I- Thank you.”

They watched the people in the courtyard for a while. The Orlesian merchant had returned, visibly intoxicated and carrying a bag of coins.

“I think I’ll try my luck at Wicked Grace,” Anders said, pointing at him, a crooked smile back on his lips.

* * *

With Anders gone, Coraline had free reign to do some magic, finally. She knew she should wait until she was away from the city, but with Severus sending goons, she wanted to get this done as soon as possible so she could get rid of the book. She set up wards on the window first -no one in the courtyard would see anything out of the ordinary should they look up. She guessed she had a few hours until Anders came back.

It took her the better part of the evening to translate the books -Tevene was annoyingly metaphorical, words tended to have double meanings, and it got worse the older the books were. One would think that technical volumes would at least be more straightforward, but Tevinter magisters always put style over substance.

She glanced outside. Anders seemed to be on a winning streak at the Wicked Grace table, now lit by paper lights hanging from the trees and the stars up above. She had time.

An eye on the diagrams of the book, she moved into the traditional spell-casting stance and sent her mind to the Fade.


	10. The Festival Of Lights - Part III

It had started so well.

The spell to locate the Demon had worked perfectly and her binding combination, cleverly designed after half a year of research, had held it in chains, which had been a huge relief. It had been angry, spewing insults and taunts and a number of expletives in old elvhen that she was glad she could not understand.

Then had come the killing spell. That was the main problem with powerful demons like the Forbidden Ones. Killing them in the Waking World only sent them back to the Fade, and they were nigh-impossible to kill in their domain, not to mention the possibility of them reforming, recreating themselves if their will was strong enough. She had no intention of letting Gaxkang come back to haunt her ten years from now.

Archon Almadrius’ Compendium had been comprehensive enough, and the spell doable, though demanding so much mana that she expected several days of nausea. She knew testing it on a lower demon would have attracted Gaxkang’s attention and given it time to protect itself, so she had not bothered, opting for confronting the demon head on.

Big mistake.

The spell backfired quite spectacularly, ricocheting on either her bindings or Gaxkang’s protections, hitting her square in the gut. Hitting her so hard that she blasted through the Fade away from its domain in a way reminiscent of a rag doll being thrown around by a careless child.

She landed on a Fade island in the loud noise of bones breaking. Her respiration cut, she did not even try moving. She could feel one of her ribs poking out.

“Shit,” she thought, not bothering with more complex thoughts.

She waited. In the distance, emerging from the fog ominously, the Black City towered over her little rock, floating in the ever-spreading emptiness of the Fade. She glared at it from the ground, gathering her will.

Slowly, the pain dissipated, although her rib did not get back in its place, or the hole in her belly disappear. Her left arm dangled from her shoulder quite pathetically, and she waved it curiously, knowing she should feel pain. She just felt cold instead.

If there was one advantage to the Fade, it was that she had a lot more control about what she decided to feel there. Her body in the Waking world was clearly in pieces and bleeding to death, but at least it would have the decency to do it painlessly. If she had been concerned with her looks, she could have made herself look hale again. She saw little point in it.

“That was unwise,” a voice spoke behind her, kind underneath the sternness.

Coraline turned towards it. A spirit, clad in ethereal armour, was approaching with the familiar, measured stride of a warrior. She squinted at them. “Justice?”

The spirit nodded. “Warden-Commander,” he greeted her in a voice that was not Anders'.

Delight illuminated her face. She had been right! Damn, if only she was not about to die, she could rub it in Anders’ face. “You survived!”

“So did you, for now.”

She shrugged with what she had left of dignity. “Well. I’ve had a good run.”

That was not quite true, but there was no point breaking down in tears. She looked down to the blood dripping down her midsection. She was a goner, alright. She opted to simply not process the situation at all, putting whatever emotions she refused to feel in the same locked room as the pain she should be feeling.

The spirit, without any consideration for such mortal things as emotional turmoil, asked, “what happened? I felt a great disturbance in the Fade before your appearance here.”

She rolled her eyes. “I got into a fistfight with one of the Forbidden Ones. I lost.” There was little point in rehashing the past. She did not have long left, and spending it dwelling on her last failure only made it taste bitter. What she wanted was a distraction. “How did _you_ get here?”

“I don’t see how that’s going to be any help to the situation at hand.”

“It’s going to distract me from my impending doom,” she jested, dangling her shattered arm emphatically. The complete absence of pain made said impending doom not seem so terrifying.

The spirit obeyed. “When I saved Anders’ life, I was expelled from the waking world. I was... lost, weak, meandering in unexplored parts of the Fade. The Oracle helped me find my way back.” Justice, with no sense of theatrics, made for a poor storyteller. “Many nights since, I have tried to reach Anders across his dreams, unsuccessfully. I do not know what hinders my attempts.”

Coraline thought back to the nightmares that plagued the mage. “I’ve got an inkling.” She waved her hand dismissively. “Why didn’t you try me?”

The spirit made a sound that could almost have passed for laughter. “Your mental wards are far stronger than his. You have not taken them down since I met you in the Blackmarsh.”

“In my defence, a lot of things have tried to possess me. Can't blame a girl for being careful.” She smiled vaguely at him, weariness creeping over her. “What are you going to do once you contact Anders?”

“I am… unsure. I feel home, here." Coraline surveyed their dreary, greenish surroundings with the most sceptical of looks, but said nothing. "I know this feeling, now, through Anders. I do not wish to cross over to the waking world again, and yet… I cannot leave the people of your world without the Justice they deserve.”

“The Justice they deserve… Wouldn't _that_ be nice.”

“It would be just.”

Coraline let out an amused huff of air that turned into a yawn. The spirit stared at her, missing his own joke.

“Your body is using all your energy to try and survive in the waking world,” he explained, making Coraline raise her eyebrows.

“How do you know that?”

“I shared a healer’s mind for several years. I learned several facts about mortal bodies.”

“Anything else I should know?”

“Your muscles relax when you die. You will most likely relieve yourself as-”

“Alright, let me rephrase: anything that is not going to make me feel worse?”

“… No.”

“Oh well.”

They stood next to each other in silence for a while, until Coraline could not resist a joke.

“How long is this going to take, exactly?”

The spirit, now more distressed than her, took his time to answer. “Judging from your wounds, your death should happen in a few minutes in the waking world, most likely less. If Anders is there, you might survive yet.”

She snorted and looked at the puddle of blood at her feet. “He’s good, but I don’t think he’s that good.”

“I warned you, mage,” a voice came, low and grave and reverberating through the green emptiness.

Justice drew his sword. “A demon. Pride!”

Coraline put a hand on his gauntleted shoulder. “It’s alright. It’s just Mouse.”

“A Pride Demon. We must kill it,” Justice protested as righteously as one can.

“Don’t worry. I don’t need a Pride Demon to give into Pride.” Justice did not laugh, but Mouse did, approaching under the guise of a mage once again, his favourite form. “You’re not allowed to kill him, he’s got good advice every once in a while.”

“Advice which is only useful if you listen to it.”

Coraline rolled her eyes. “It was a good idea and you know it. If I had time to figure why the spell backfired and-”

Mouse laughed. “Pride indeed.”

“Do not talk to it!” Justice interjected, sword still drawn. Coraline ignored him.

“How did you find me?”

“Your spell rippled through realms, mage. I wanted to see what mortal was foolish and prideful enough to oppose Gaxkang himself.”

“Well, there you go. Happy?”

“Not particularly. You are interesting, as much as your kind can be, not to mention his death would have left a large area free for the taking. As of now, he is still bound by your spell.”

That made her think. “How long will the binds hold?”

“For me or your helmeted friend here? A lifetime, without doubt. For one of the Forbidden Ones? I would wager a month or two.”

Coraline pondered this new information. If she survived, and this was a big if, she would have time to alter the destruction spell and recast it, this time successfully. Mouse chucked, knowing full well what she was thinking. Pride, indeed. She yawned again, exhaustion taking over curiosity.

“You know, if you let me in, I could save your life,” Mouse commented. Justice interposed himself between them, glowing like a damn beacon of righteousness.

“Good one,” she said, shaking her head to shake off the torpor, still managing a chortle.

The demon shrugged. “It was worth a try.”

“Do not listen to it,” Justice said. “Pride does not care for your wellbeing.”

“Well, that’s just rude,” Pride said, seemingly offended. “There is really no need to be so combative all the time. Learn to relax a little, Justice.”

“And give in to Sloth? Have you no honour?”

Coraline stood there and watched them argue, the conversation taking a slightly surrealist turn. Was she hallucinating? “Are you seriously-” They ignored her.

“I have common sense, which is far more than I can say for you.”

“Common sense would have urged you to run away as soon as you saw me, demon.”

“Pfft. With your little sword and your overly shiny helmet? You don’t scare me, _spirit_.”

“Hey, I’m dying here. Would you two mind-”

* * *

The cold numbness she had welcomed in the Fade turned into good old searing pain as her consciousness snapped back to the waking world. Her whole body was screaming bloody murder (which was sort of justified, considering) and the light she perceived through closed lids already shone bright enough to be agonizing. Either being dead was far more painful than any religion had ever theorized, or she was very much alive.

She tried to swallow, only to find she had no more saliva. Her mouth was drier than the Maker-forsaken Hissing Wastes.

“You’re alright. Don’t open your eyes,” a voice said. Anders. Alive. “Drink.”

A hand came behind her head, lifting her up. All the muscles of her back and her shoulders protested and she felt herself shiver in a cold sweat. She grimaced, too tired to express her pain any louder. A cup was providentially brought to her lips and the water titled in her mouth, cool and clear and wonderful.

“Careful, not too much at once.”

She opened her mouth to speak, but it demanded too much effort.

“You’ll be alright. Sleep, now.”

Coraline had questions. Where was she? When was she? How badly injured was she? How long until- Anders’ spell washed over her and a dreamless, safe, sleep took her.

* * *

From the way light streamed in from the window, Coraline guessed it was early morning. At least, now awake, she could answer some of her own questions. She was still in the rented room in the inn, and the damage was… considerable, judging by the comically large bandage around her midsection. She grimaced. She would be stuck on bed rest for at least a day. She’d almost have rather died. The realization of what had happened – what had almost happened – finally hit her and a hysterical giggle slipped out sideways.

“You’ll need at least three weeks of bed rest.” Anders was looking up at her, sitting on the sofa across the room. Her jaw dropped. Three weeks? The mage rose, discarding his book.

“What else did you expect?” Coraline found herself so taken aback by his tone that it took her an uncharacteristically long time to realize she was being scolded. “Going around casting spells from old Tevinter books? There’s a reason half of these volumes are banned, not to mention the risk of mistranslating something. I can’t believe how lucky you got.”

Lucky, really? She had failed spectacularly in her endeavour, and had less than a month to fix it before Gaxkang came back with a vengeance. And that was only if Mouse had been right about his estimation… She stifled a shocked laugh. Unfortunately for her, he noticed. “Yes, lucky! I spent three days keeping you alive, because of… I don’t even know what you were doing!”

Ah, so he was angry she had ruined his festivities. Well, she hadn’t asked for his help anyway. None of this would even have happened if he had not been around; she would have taken more time to prepare her spell, would have checked for potential morbidities in her bindings... And he had the gall to keep staring at her reproachfully, like he was about to punish her to twenty days of cleaning the Circle’s kitchen. Well, no. She put on her best ‘Commander of the Grey’ voice.

“Are you quite done?” In her position, she could not cross her arms so she settled for a glare.

He blinked in surprise, before doubling down. “No, I am not done.” He grabbed the Midnight Compendium from the little table by the door and shook it at her. “The first two chapters of this… dog shit are about demonic bindings. It’s blood magic! Were you  _ trying _ to kill yourself? And your wards- Andraste’s breath, it’s a miracle they even held… Do you know the number of people you could have killed? You included?”

He stopped to take a breath. Coraline decided she had heard enough.

“Get out,” she hissed. She had bigger problems that an angry healer, and all of them were Gaxkang coming unbound.

He held her glare a moment before leaving, telling her that he would be back in a few hours to change her bandages and shaking his head. Coraline let her head fall back on the pillow. She was more exhausted than angry and, as much as it pained her to admit it, Anders and Mouse were right. She should have been more cautious.

In the hour or so that followed, instead of resting and sleeping like she should, she made plans. She resolved to leave Ayesleigh as soon as she was able; she needed to be away from settlements to recast her spells, this time with proper testing. She also needed to inform Anders of Justice’s situation. After racking her brains trying -and failing- to find a way to tell him that was appropriately tactful, she decided to leave the matter for another time.

And of course, there was the matter of him finding the Midnight Compendium. He would ask questions that would get hard to evade, what with being stuck in bed and everything. Coraline found herself unsure of what his reaction would be should she tell him the truth. Would he simply run away? She needed him, for at least three weeks now. Or would he try to help? But helping would put him in the line of fire, and Gaxkang was not an enemy to be trifled with.

Incapable of telling which option would be worse, she decided to simply cross that bridge if she ever got to it. In the meantime, there were more important things to do, like pen that letter to Zevran. And eat, because she was famished.

Her stomach growled as she surveyed the room helplessly. There was no food anywhere.

Someone knocked on the door. “It’s Anaya. I’m bringing food, healer’s orders.”

Had she been Andrastian, Coraline would have seen in this a sign of divine goodwill. “Come on in.”

“Anders said I should make sure you eat it. You’ll need strength to recover.”

Coraline grimaced at the sight of the platter, much like a child in front of vegetables.

“It’s funny, he said you’d make that face.”

“It’s _broth_,” she said, the same way an Orlesian noblewoman might say ‘it’s Fereldan’. “What am I, old and toothless?”

Anaya put the tray in front of her only for Coraline to ignore it intently. Couldn’t they give her pastries instead, for moral support if anything?

“Want me to do ‘here comes the dragon’?”

Coraline narrowed her eyes at her suspiciously. “What?”

“You know, for children.” She mimed grabbing a spoonful of broth and bringing it swinging toward Coraline’s face. “Here comes the dragon, open wide!”

“Are you kidding me?”

“What, don’t you do that in the South?”

Coraline blinked at her twice. Her stomach growled and she sighed. “This is stupid. Give me the damn spoon.”

While she ate the  _ unsalted _ broth, Anaya recounted to her the aftermath of her monumental failure, from the panic that swept through the courtyard at the explosion noise to the vigil Anders held by her side the following days. Clearly, Anaya had a knack for poetic hyperbole. 

At least, the building had suffered no damage; as it turned out, her shields were not entirely worthless. The only casualty, besides herself, had been the floor of the room, of which a layer had been turned to cinder. Anaya said her mother had already bought a rug to hide the damage; she had wanted to redecorate for years, apparently. When Coraline tried to apologize, she waved it away, saying that if anything, business at the tavern had actually increased, with curious neighbours coming in to ask questions and staying for a meal.

Which brought another problem to Coraline’s attention. There was no way the mercenaries had missed the explosion, which meant they would soon be visiting the inn.

“You ought to do that more often,” Anaya concluded.

Coraline glanced at her bandages. “Maybe next year.”

* * *

Only a few hours passed after Anaya left, but it could have been a century as far as Coraline was concerned. She had written her letter to Zevran, which was now waiting to be sent off on the bedside table. She had read the book on fencing Anders had left on her bedside table, underlined all the passable innuendos in it (‘Efficient thrusting must be swift and powerful’ was her favourite, if only for the sheer blatancy of it), only to finally give up and make little paper birds out of the torn pages. When she had ran out of paper, she had taken the bouquet on her night stand and had meticulously destroyed every single flower. The bright yellow ones had more petals than the big daisies, the pale pink ones all had five, and the big fragrant ones had between eight and twelve, with an average of nine. All the petals now laid on the bed among the paper cranes.

In short, she was about to go completely insane from boredom.

She usually enjoyed a lazy day as much as the next woman, but she had more important things to do than rest. Taunting her was the Compendium on the table by the door. If only she could get her hands on it, she could get some work done, figure out where the killing spell and her bindings are clashed. Surely getting up to get it would not hurt her recovery much. She pushed the sheet down. Moving made her feel like someone was repeatedly stabbing her in the stomach, but she managed to sit upright and push her legs out of the bed. The air blew oddly cool against her bare skin. Touching the floor with her toes felt like a little victory.

She waited a minute, feeling light-headed.

“_What_ are you doing?” Anders was standing at the door, looking every bit like an annoyed healer. Which he was.

Oops. “I’m bored.” Technically the truth.

Anders, frustratingly mobile, approached with three long strides and forced her back down in the bed, gentle but firm. She did not even bother resisting. “Bed rest means resting in bed.”

“But I’ve got nothing to do.”

“Yes, the rest of us call that resting. Stay put, or I will tie you down.” She caught the innuendo before he did and raised an eyebrow at him, accompanied by a hint of a smile. He put a weary hand over his eyes. “Andraste’s sword, I didn’t mean… It doesn't matter. You need bed rest.”

“Why do I even need bed rest?” she gestured to her bandages, “Can’t you just fix it, _spirit healer_?”

He glared at her silently for far too long. “No. You messed up some convoluted spell that I can’t quite figure out, and all the extra energy pooled into there.” He gesture at her bandaged stomach. “I’ve used spirit healing for the broken arm, broken orbital bone, punctured lung and about a dozen other things, but I can’t close the wound here, the mana transfer would tear you in two. And I mean that literally. I can only use traditional healing spells.”

“Oh.” Fascinating. Was that an after-effect of the Archon’s curse, or had her bindings been damaged by the spell, the energy going back to her body? And if so, were they less powerful now? She needed to go to the Fade and check. Anders would probably have a heart attack if she suggested it.

“Yes, oh. Now show me your bandages, I need to check on them.” She laid back flat and he pulled up her tunic. “At least, you haven’t reopened anything,” Anders said after some careful prodding.

He proceeded to unroll her bandages, which took far longer than Coraline had thought it would. At least he was not lecturing her on the dangers of spellcasting this time. When he was done, he went to get ingredients in his satchel, an opportunity Coraline used to look down at her wound.

It was… less gruesome than she had anticipated. Her skin was burnt and missing completely in some places, with a long line of hand-sewn stitches running across her abdomen. She tried to touch the scar.

“Don’t do that, you’re going to bring infection into it. I did what I could, but you need time for the organs to repair.” Anders warned, already back at her side, holding several poultices. She drew her hand back to her side. “It’s really not that bad,” he added sweetly, misreading her curiosity for horror.

“It’s going to look way less cool that the dragon claw mark I had before.”

He kneeled down by the bed, opening one of his tiny jars. “That’s a shame. I bet it looked fantastic on you.” He was trying to cheer her up, and he was being so obvious about it she could not help but smile.

“I’ve already got one on my back. A second was overkill, anyway.”

This did not seem to make him laugh, however. He glanced at her quickly with an expression she could not decipher and got to work on her wounds, applying poultices and checking the healing progress. Coraline let him, trying not to move, even when the lightest brush of his fingers felt like a blade cutting her open.

He had precise movements, deliberate and slow enough that his touches were never startling on her skin. His hands were warm; maybe he used a spell before meeting his patients for their comfort. That wouldn’t be surprising. His untied collar had an elfroot extract stain on the side, a dark green splatter on the cream linen. Her gaze slid up; he had a shadow of a beard, almost ginger and patchy in places.

“What were you thinking,” Anders muttered to himself as he inspected his application of poultices. A thick coat of green, grey and red creams covered her abdomen. “What were you doing?”

She shook off the blush that menaced to creep on her cheeks. “Well, I just found this book in the market and I figured, might as well.”

“What? Try out a spell from the _Midnight Compendium_? That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

She sniggered. “You need to get out more.”

He sent her a look that clearly said he did not believe her in the slightest. “Seriously, though. Why?”

“Mostly, I wanted to piss off a magister,” she said very matter-of-factly. If anything, that should be distracting enough that he would forget his question.

He stopped working, a hand covered in reddish grey cream. “What?”

“It’s a long story. Speaking of, a couple of mercenaries might come by at some point looking for me.”

“What did you drag me into, exactly?”

“Nothing!” she protested. “As far as the Tev knows, I’m travelling alone, and if anyone comes by, they’ll just assume you’re a random healer. You’ve got nothing to do with this.”

“Mmh. How powerful is this magister?”

“Not much. He’s rich, but he’s an idiot. He’ll send a few people eventually, hopefully after I’ve skipped town.” She downplayed it a little, of course, and did not mention the far greater danger she would be in if Gaxkang evaded his bounds somehow.

It took a small eternity, but Anders finally bandaged her all back up, after which he spent another small eternity explaining what her diet would be for the next week, which hurt almost as much as the bandaging had. She had not survived a Blight to be stuck eating broth and unflavoured yogurt.

“I hate you,” she told him flatly.

He smirked at her. “If you’re lucky, you should be able to eat porridge in about two weeks. Unflavoured, obviously.” He looked so very proud of himself.

“If I could, I’d be throwing that vase at you right about now.”

“I’m sure you would.”

Anders smiled, but from the shifting on one foot and the slight narrowing of his eyes, Coraline guessed he was about to turn the conversation back to how exactly she had gotten herself injured. Distraction. “Hey, can you do me a favour?”

He grinned. “Apart from saving your life, you mean?”

She rolled her eyes and grabbed the letter for Zevran from the bedside table. “So, I need this letter sent.”

“No problem, I can find you a merchant.”

Hook. “See, I’d rather not. I’ve got this spell for delivering letters.”

“But you agreed! No casting until the energy in you dissipates! I haven’t put you back together just to see you explode.”

Line. “I know, relax. That’s why I need you to do it for me.” She handed him the letter.

“I don't know the spell.”

And sinker. “Oh, don’t worry, it's really easy,” she smiled.

Half an hour later, the letter for Zevran was sent and Anders was gushing about her little spell.

“This is wonderful.” It meant more than when Alistair had said more or less the same thing and Coraline had to make a conscious effort not to blush. After all, Anders actually knew what he was talking about.

“I had quite a bit of help.” Morrigan had been the one to teach her the animal control part. Alexa the Arcane Warrior had figured out which location sigils to use. Even Jowan had thrown a few ideas around, leading to some improvements.

“Still, this is clever.” He squinted at the diagrams she had drawn him. “I like the use of a Divination Attunement to make the distant location work. And that stabilization spell is, wow. Do you have any others?”

“Well, I made one that muffles all the sounds you make. It would be really useful for stealing stuff, only you have to shout the incantation or it doesn’t work.”

Anders squinted at her. “You've kidding.”

“Unfortunately no,. I’ve got a few others like that. Like the spell that enlarges ladders, but only ladders. And that one curse that makes corpses glow. It’s completely useless and also sort of creepy. Unless you’re fighting undead in a swamp, in which case it’s very useful and extremely creepy.”

“What I would give for a look in your grimoire,” Anders chuckled. She made a face at him, scrunching her nose and raising an eyebrow. “Get your head out of the gutter, I really meant it.”

“Oh. Thanks, I guess, but I don’t have one anyway.”

“You don’t?” Anders seemed genuinely surprised.

“Of course not, grimoires are for scary old swamp witches.”

“I’ve never met a mage without a grimoire before. How do you remember all your spells?”

“… I have a functioning brain?”

Anders managed to sigh, snort, and snigger at the same time, and Coraline figured he had forgotten all about his questions.

A moment passed. Anders made to leave but seemed to think better of it. He leaned against the door frame and readjusted the strap of his satchel on his shoulder. Maybe it was just his tied hair, but she thought, not for the first time, that he did not seem to have aged at all since Amaranthine. The way the light from the window fell on him, golden and slanted, distracted her and she did not see the question coming.

“You still haven’t told me.”

There we go, she thought. Coraline could tell she was not going to enjoy this; that she was injured and lying down was not helping the power dynamics either. She painted innocent surprise on her face. “Told you what?”

“Why you though this,” he gestured to the book, and then to her bandages, “was a good idea. Riling up magisters? Come you, you’re cleverer than this.”

‘I made a deal with a demon and now I’m trying to kill it before it comes collect’ refused to come out of her mouth, because he might bolt, and because he might not, and she could not figure out which outcome would be worse. She opted to drop a metaphorical bomb on him. To the Void with subtlety.

“I saw Justice.” It worked too, which she had the decency to feel mildly guilty about. Anders straightened himself, mouth agape. She did not leave him time to process. “In the Fade. We had a nice chat. He’s having trouble reaching you, but the Oracle that may be able to help.”

“You talked to him?”

“Anaya says there’s a woman called that in Asfaanoye, a village north of here. About three hours walk.”

Anders seemed to stop functioning for a moment, and then disappeared down the stairs.

Coraline settled back down on her pillows, satisfied. Justice and Anders would see each other again, and this conversation would never have to take place. Everybody won.


	11. A Most Daring Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh, an update :) I recommend everyone reading this to re-read the whole thing, as I have added *~plot~* (lol) and some bits have changed a little, especially regarding Coraline's characterisation.

The next morning, a timid knock on the door woke her. The lingering pain had made her sleep far lighter than usual, as had the absence of wards. “Can I come in?”

The voice was not Anaya’s, but it was female. She propped herself up on her pillows. “Of course.”

“Can I leave those here for your healer?” The woman held a tray of delicious-smelling baked goods, making Coraline nod enthusiastically. Unfortunately, she left them on the table by the door, desperately out of reach. This was going to be torture, not being able to steal any. “I’ll tell him you stopped by. You are..?”

“Tsitsi." She had a lovely face. “I’ll leave you to rest, now.”

* * *

Anders was in a mood when he came to change her bandages a few hours later. Coraline figured it was just general morning grumpiness. Barely giving him time to put down his satchel, she asked, “did you see Justice?”

“Yes.”

He did not even look at her, and without another word, started on her wound, his hands less gentle than the previous day. Coraline hesitated. Had his meeting with the spirit not gone well?

“Tsitsi left you some pastries,” she cajoled, trying for a different approach.

He glanced at the tray and said, “I saw,” then went back to undoing her bandages, his careless touches making her wince a couple of times.

“Was Justice alright?”

“Yes.”

If Anders was going to be mono-syllabic _ and _passive-aggressive, there was not much she could do, so she waited with gritted teeth until he removed the last bandage, when she had to bite her hand to swallow her yell. She was sure that he had taken some skin with it.

“Andraste- I’m sorry. I didn’t mean...” She scowled at Anders, who looked genuinely upset at himself.

“You’re not forgiven until you tell me what gotten into you,” she snarled.

He stood up, throwing the bandages on the floor. It might have scared someone less _ her _, but neither his towering figure nor his glowering eyes moved her. “You made a deal with a demon!”

Damn Justice and his loose tongue. Anders was still glaring at her. She let out a sigh. “He exaggerated a little.”

Anders’ expression did not shift one iota. “No he didn’t.”

She hesitated, not seeing an acceptable way out of the conversation. “Look, I didn’t have a choice.”

“I’m sure that’s the excuse of blood mages everywhere.”

“I’m not a-” She made her decision in a split second. If he wanted to be like that, so could she, consequences be damned. “Look, if you’re looking for an apology, that’s just not going to happen. If you have a problem with that, you might as well leave.”

A tense silence settled between them. Coraline fully expected him to walk out there and then, leaving her lying with an exposed wound. She did not care. Not at all. Not even a little. Her heartbeat quickened to uncomfortable speeds.

But he did not move, glaring back at her like she was somehow in the wrong here. She had cured (mostly) the bloody Taint, she was not about to apologize for the methods employed to get there. Going to Gaxkang had been her choice, and it had been a damn clever one too, considering none of the people in the room had prophetic nightmares about Archdemons anymore. It had _worked_. She held his gaze, furious at his holier-than-thou attitude.

Anders broke the silence. “I don’t want an apology. I want an explanation.”

Coraline hesitated between a lie and a truth. With the skin on her abdomen still burning from his treatment, she settled on telling him to fuck off. He had no right to demand anything from her. “After what you just pulled? In your dreams.”

Anders, at least, had the decency to look somewhat ashamed of himself. Although she could understand where he was coming from, he had no right to hurt her, especially not on purpose. A long moment stretched as he seemed to consider leaving. After a while, he simply went back to applying his salves, far more light-fingered than earlier, as if that might somehow make up for the skin painted on the soiled bandages on the floor.

* * *

Coraline concentrated all her energy on re-translating the damned Compendium, spending day and night figuring out exactly why the spell had backfired. The idea that she might be bedridden for three weeks while Gaxkang worked at freeing itself from his bonds unsettled her so much she could not sleep anyway.

Anders came to see her twice the last day of the Festival to change her bandages, hopelessly professional. She hated it. That night, they shot fireworks from the bay. She heard the noises from the room that was starting to feel like a prison, the Compendium on her side and drafts of spells covering the bed. Eventually, as the sun rose on the city, she found a way to remove the excess energy in her body. All that was left to do was get Anders to finish healing her and she could be on her way. He would not even have to talk to her again.

Anaya sneaked her half a small brioche for breakfast, along with some books, including all of Varric Tethras’ -clearly a fan. The rest were romances, like the ones older mages used to smuggle into the Circle, and a book of Orlesian poetry, which was absolutely terrible -so terrible, in fact, it ‘spontaneously’ combusted.

She waited all morning for Anders to come by, but he did not, only showing up at lunchtime, after she had finished ‘Templar Take Me Away’ and gotten halfway through ‘Servant of the Crown’. Decidedly, romance was not her genre.

“Show me the bandages,” he asked. He had not bothered with greetings in two days. She obeyed, seeing no point in arguing.

“I’ve figured out how to remove the extraneous energy,” she said. “You should be able to use spirit healing, if you think that’s a good idea.” He stared at her a few seconds; she noticed the coloured powders on his shoulder and the beer stain on his collar -clearly, he had had a fun night watching the fireworks, which also explained his late morning. At least someone was having fun. He ran a number of diagnostics spells on her before giving her reason.

“Nice work,” he said after a while.

“So, can you heal it?”

He took his time to answer, as if he might just lie to her. “Yes. It’s going to take a while.”

She readjusted her back against the pillows and let him work in silence. As before, his magic swirled around his hands, pure and gentle. She had no idea how spirit healing really worked, beyond the whole ‘asking spirits for help’, but watching Anders manipulate energies was a visual treat in its own right, even when he was being a bullheaded sanctimonious prick.

“I can’t do it,” he said after a few minutes, lowering his hands.

“Is it still some residual energy blocking you?” She had gotten the spells right, she was sure of it.

“No.”

“What is it, then?” He stared at her and she saw the semi-desperate look in his eyes. “What’s wrong?”

“I can’t stop thinking about the demon..” He stood up, pacing away from her. “What did you ask for? I have driven myself mad asking what it was. You’re already powerful, more than any mage I know.” She did not understand why he looked so conflicted.

She shrugged. “Why does it matter?”

He raised his arms in exasperation. “Because it does! I thought you were my friend, and-” The words caught her unprepared, forcing her to acknowledge that maybe she did not only care for him out of a sense of duty left over from her days at Vigil’s Keep. That they were, arguably, in an odd sort of way, tentative friends. Perhaps. Or at least had been, a couple of days ago, before he decided to be an ass.

“And what?”

“And you’re a blood mage!”

The accusation was ridiculous. At most, she was a non-practising blood mage, which was a risible concept and a mouthful to say. She argued his point anyway. If he thought himself her friend, then he might as well learn to handle some truths. “So what if I was? There’s nothing wrong with it.”

Anders’ face turned a fascinating shade of red. “There’s noth- Of all the ridiculous, ignorant ramblings I’ve ever heard! You can’t be that big an idiot! You see nothing wrong with blood magic? With mind control, with deals with demons, with killing for power? I thought you were decent!”

She raised her eyebrows at his diatribe, refusing to give into his bait and keeping her voice steady and controlled. “First of all, fuck you. Second of all, the only reason blood magic is vilified is because the Templars can’t control blood mages. It doesn’t bother them when they make our phylacteries with blood magic, does it? It’s only alright when _they_ do it? I think not.”

“Blood magic is evil! The Chant teaches us-”

“Oh, shut up. I don’t care what the Chant says. I don’t care what the Maker wants. I. Don’t. Care. If you need a song to tell you right from wrong then it’s hardly my fault, is it?” She knew she was laying it on a little thick, exaggerating even her own stance on the matter. But she simply could not help herself, his loud self-righteousness reminding her of the old Chantry Mother in Kinloch Hold she had hated in secret for more than a decade. This was cathartic.

Anders took a step back, as if she had struck him physically. “I won’t take lessons on morality from a blood mage!”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m a natural at entropy. I can pump someone so full of magic they literally explode. I can give you nightmares so deep that you wouldn’t even notice a knife between your ribs. I can steal people’s life force to feel them die if I want to. None of this requires me to pop open a vein, but somehow blood magic is what makes you tick?”

“You’re completely mad!”

“And you’re an imbecile.” She sniffed arrogantly and he simply stared at her, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. “So much for friendship, huh.”

Anders wiped his forehead. “I need- I need a moment.” He left without ceremony, fleeing the room.

So much for friendship indeed. If she had been ambivalent about Anders’ reaction to her dealing with Gaxkang, at least now she was set. The knowledge tasted sour in her mouth. Coraline closed her eyes and settled back down against her pillows. He had not even healed her. She chastised herself; she could have, she already saw a dozen ways she could have, twisted the conversation to make him heal her. A white lie about honour and self-sacrifice to help the many… He would have believed it, or at least, he would have wanted to believe it.

But no. He had, somehow, managed to rile her up, getting her to argue, even though she knew it never lead to anything. To the Void with him.

To her surprise, annoyance, and relief all at once, Anders came back a few minutes later. She had assumed he had left, at least for the day if not for good.

“Tell me. You have to tell me.”

Coraline relented, because he had come back. There was no point dancing around the truth now. “Take a guess, you idiot. What did I do in the last couple of years that might have required the help of an ancient demon?”

It did not take him long. “The cure for the calling.”

“Ta-da!” She raised her arms in mocked triumph, before wincing at the pain in her abdomen, letting out a curse.

Anders curled his lips in disgust. “What was in that thing?”

She rolled her eyes. Did the man really have to be this dramatic all the time? “Oh, so now, you want to know. I didn’t see you complain when it saved your life.”

“Coraline.” The warning made her want to tell him to go jump into the Fade, but she answered anyway, because _he had come back_.

“Fine. Long story short, I figured a number of things about Blight magic, and I needed information from someone who was there when the Titans were still a thing, and, well, the Forbidden Ones were the obvious choice.”

There was a long pause. “I understood none of this, you realize that? Titans? Blight magic?”

Well. She could hardly resist the opportunity for a small joke. “You know. The magic of the Blight.”

He rose an eyebrow, unamused. “Yes, I understood the words.”

She sighed. “The taint carries magical power. It’s what the Emissaries use as the source of their magic. Technically, Grey Wardens are also capable of accessing it, even those without natural magical talent. Anyway. I needed some… insight, which is where Gaxkang came into play.” She evaded the question about Titans, and Anders did not seem to notice, which suited her just fine.

In fact, he seemed to give up on arguing at all. “I can’t feel his presence in you.”

“Kinky,” she said, the joke falling flat as Anders glowered at her, too serious for his own good. “You’re right, I sort of… owe it a body. Needs to be an elven mage, it was oddly specific about that. A virgin, ideally, too.” If he wanted the truth, she might as well give him the whole rotten plate.

“You’re joking. Please tell me you’re joking.”

“I’m afraid not. I’ve got until Midsummer’s Eve or I’m the one getting abominationed.” Anders put his head in his hands. “In the meantime, I’ve got it tied up like a nug roast in the Fade. I just need to figure out the right spell to kill it permanently. Almost got it.” She pointed at the pile of scribblings and the Compendium on the bedside table.

“Can you please not say anything for a while?” Anders pleaded, slumping down on the chair next to her bed. “I don’t think my brain can take it.”

She lied back down. “Sure.”

He redid her bandages, dead silent, applying the poultices like he had before instead of just spirit healing the damn wound away. She figured she could wait a day to remind him. He left without saying goodbye, as if talking or looking at her might get him possessed. But she figured it was alright, because at least _he had come back_.

She re-opened the Midnight Compendium and continued her research, wishing she had a dictionary. Translating Ancient Tevene was a pain.

* * *

Tsitsi the baker rushed in her room the next morning, closely followed by Anaya.

“It’s Anders, the healer!” she cried out, dishevelled and frazzled.

Coraline yawned. “What did he do now?”

“No, no, no. He didn’t do anything, he got taken!”

The words woke her up as efficiently as a cold shower. Coraline guessed that Severus’ mercenaries were behind it. They must have noticed the explosion a few days prior, and taken the healer in to ‘question’.

Anaya, bless her, calmed down the young baker and explained. “Tsitsi here saw three men take him a few minutes ago as he was going to the hospital. She found his staff on the ground.” The hospital? “They went towards the docks.”

“Anything else? What did they look like?”

“You know, mercenaries. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Alright. Help me up.” Anaya obliged and Coraline found herself standing, painfully. “Tsitsi, go get me his staff. Anaya, can you find me some bandages? I’ll need these done tighter.”

“You can’t even walk.”

“I’ve got a spell for that.” A spell that would only last a couple of hours and probably cause her brain to explode afterwards, but a spell nonetheless. She needed to act fast.

Minutes later, she was off, leaning slightly on Anders’ staff, the Midnight Compendium safely locked behind three layers of deadly curses under her bed and the pain in her stomach hidden between illusions and head tricks. It would not keep her stitches closed, or prevent her wound from worsening under the friction of the bandages, but at least she could not feel anything. Her spell tugged at her mind, the mana upkeep it demanded high enough to be a constant ticking noise in her head.

Luckily, she knew where to begin her search and went directly to the docks. More specifically, the customs office. She did not bother greeting the clerk at the entrance and sent the whole floor to the realm of dreams before going upstairs. She did not plan on being there long.

She slammed the office door open. “I need a favour.”

Aurelian was a large bald man, who spent most of his time sitting and counting sovereigns. He had, somehow, achieved what so many had dreamed of: control over the entirety of the trade happening in the port. Somehow here meaning, with her help, which meant _he owed her_. He looked up at her placidly, raising a hand heavy with jewellery. “Bella, always a pleasure. You didn’t need to take down my guards.”

“Sorry. Look, I’m short on time, I need information. And a message sent.”

“Alright, alright. Kids these days, no manners at all.” He shook his head, sighing like a disappointed father figure. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes, or send a fireball his way. The two were oddly similar. “Ask away.”

“I need info on the Dancing Molly. A few crewmen were a… problem earlier.”

“You mean that little massacre near Hatch Street? The bailiff is not happy.”

“The bailiff can kiss my arse.”

Aurelian tutted in disapproval. “They don’t fly the Riders’ colours. Dock seven.” Independent pirates, then. Good. She would not have to worry about retribution. “The captain… Stefano. He mostly runs slaves and spice.”

“Two of them were lyrium smugglers.”

Aurelian sighed, a look of displeasure crossing his face. “A couple of runners for the Book Club going on extra-curriculars. I’d advise against getting involved with them, they’re dangerous.” The Book Club was the main lyrium smuggling ring in Northern Thedas, rumoured to get its shipments from Kal-Sharok itself. They had never managed to get a foothold in the South, namely thanks to Alistair’s efforts on the matter. The name came from their main headquarters, located under a bookshop in Antiva City.

“And you get a cut when they use your docks, you mean.”

That made him snigger slightly. “That too.”

“Mmh. Can you get word to Bahadur? Tell him to send a small one to the ship, I need eyes in there.”

“What makes you think he’ll do it?”

“He will if you mention the Vint I’m planning on screwing over and the slave trading.” Aurelian cocked his head in understanding; it was an open secret that the crime lord’s mother was an escaped Tevinter slave. “I’ll keep the kid safe, it’s just recon. He’s got my word on that. Oh, and one more thing.”

* * *

Half an hour later, Coraline was spying on the Dancing Molly, docked just where Aurelius had said it would be. The kid, nine or ten and pointed ears, tapped her on the shoulder. She had not even seen him leave the ship -he was good.

“So?”

“They’ve a prisoner, miss. He don’t look too good.”

“Thanks. There’s a lot of them?”

The kid shrugged, his eyes darting around. “More than fingers, less than toes, but a lot are sleeping below.” A large dozen, then. She had hoped the whole crew would be sleeping their night off in the port taverns. On a normal day, she would simply have stormed the ship. With so much of her energy directed towards keeping herself pain-free, the challenge gave her pause. Maybe doable. Barely.

“That’s good. Anything else?”

“There’s strange symbols on the wood.”

“Show me.” Coraline watched the kid draw magic-nullifying symbols on a piece of parchment. The damn things were everywhere in the hull, meaning there was no way she was getting Anders out of there with brute force. She sighed, gave the kid a large handful of coins and told him to get lost. With a last look to the ship, she turned heel and went back to the Trade District.

She stopped by a shady looked apothecary shop to buy some necessities, and then went to a small blacksmith. She pushed the door open and the heat of the forge stopped her breathing for a second. His back to her, striking metal with metal, a giant, half-naked Qunari, horns almost touching the ceiling, worked his trade. “Hello Maartok.”

He did not even bother to turn around. “No.”

“I haven’t even asked yet.”

“No.” His hammer struck metal again, punctuating his words.

“For old times’ sake.”

“No.”

“Without me, you’d be dust under the Qun.”

“No.” Sparks flew. Coraline waited. Finally, Maartok put down his giant hammer, his sense of honour winning over his common sense. She smiled to herself.

“What is it?”

“I need you to stand somewhere and look scary.”

He looked down at her from his incredible height. “You are a lot of trouble for someone so small.”

She pretended to be offended.

Back on the docks. Maartok went to stand menacingly in the shadow of a street corner, half-visible from the Dancing Molly and Coraline made a beeline for the pirate ship, no cape or staff in sight. At best, she looked like a commoner. To anyone with a good eye, the short blade at her side gave her away as a common criminal, probably a thief. She was greeted by two pirates, swords drawn, barring her way. One had a peg leg, looking like a damn cliché. The other was a head shorter than her and had at least five knives that she could see on him.

“Hello. Name’s Bella. I need a word with your Captain.”

“No one’s gets on deck.”

“He owes me allowance.” The two men exchanged a glance. Hurrah. She added some drama. “Payments stopped coming six months ago, I’ve got a kid to feed here. He’s got a responsibility, you know!”

There were sighs, and then, “fine, stay here.” The short one went to find his Captain while PegLeg glared at her. She took the time she had to examine the situation. About eight to ten men on deck that she could see, none looking worried, which meant they were not expecting any trouble.

The pirate captain, hat and coat and sabre, joined them. He seemed to be in his late twenties and had the look of a disgraced Antivan nobleman about him, probably a fourth son without land or title.

“Bella I presume?”

Ah, so he was not a complete idiot. She sniffed inelegantly, leaning on the pile of barrels next to her. “Yesh. I need a word ‘bout your latest employer.”

“Sure. First of all, play tricks on my men again and your pretty friend below gets it.”

She widened her eyes in surprise. “My.. friend?”

“The mage. The healer. You came in the city with him.”

She rolled her eyes, figuring out her approach on instinct. It always served her well. “Oh, that guy. I’m on my way to hand him over to some noble. There’s a bounty on his head.”

“What?”

“Yeah, guy’s name’s André de Marchand. Orlesian prick, wet his cock where he shouldn't have.” She lowered her tone to whisper very loudly. “A duke’s daughter. It’s all pretty funny, but the man’s worth two hundred gold, plus thanks from the La Mirandola.” The Captain’s eyes shone more at the mention of nobility than they did at the mention of gold. Coraline held back a smirk. She had him like a rabbit in a snare. “I’m supposed to collect today, but I’d rather deal with this bullshit first.”

Stefano stopped dreaming of nobles and came back to the ground, glaring at her a hand on his sabre. If he was indeed the son of a noble family, there was no doubt he knew how to use it. “What do you want?”

“A deal. I’ll give you the book, for a hundred and fifty sovereigns.”

The captain laughed. “You’ve got guts, I’ll give you that. How about this: I take the book from you and I don’t kill you.”

“That’s nice. One problem.” She pointed to a shadowy corner on the far end on the dock. “See the Qunari over there? First sign of trouble and he runs. The punchline? He’s the one with the book, and he’ll run all the way to Seheron. Good luck getting it then.”

The Captain gritted his teeth. “You little bitch.”

Coraline shrugged. “I’m a thief. What’d you expect” She paused. “Deal?”

“You’ve killed one of my men. And three hires.”

She shrugged, unconcerned. “Wasn’t me. You think you’re the only ones after that damn book? Your magister’s got competition, and the fuckers’ got magic, too. Abolitionist mages or some shit, and not willing to barter either. I barely made it out of that damn alley.”

“How can I be sure they won’t come after me after I get the book?”

“That sounds like a you problem to me.”

The Captain thought about it. He had no reason not to take her deal; he would walk away with the book, which he had clearly been promised a great deal of money to find. And she was about to give him another hundred reasons to take it. “A hundred and fifty?” He asked.

“The bounty on André’s two hundred, I get half. I was supposed to be paid fifty for the book, you do the counting,” Coraline explained.

Stefano tapped his fingers on his sabre handle, pondering. Coraline waited for the obvious question. “Half?”

“We’ll split, fair and square. Look, if we don’t, I run away with the book and loose the bounty. I only make fifty. And you get the Orlesian, but you don’t know where to get your money’s worth, and your magister’s pissed. Either we share the bounty or no one’s got any ale money tomorrow. My contact’s waiting, by the way.”

“Your contact? The La Mirandola are Antivan, what are you trying to pull?”

“We’ve got a meeting place here. They want this taken care of out of the Crow’s… well, talons.”

“Puns,” the man grimaced while she smirked. “Where are you meeting?”

“Somewhere on the docks.” She snorted. “If I tell you now, I lose my half of the robes’ bounty, I’m no green. I take you there and then we trade.”

The Captain mulled this over, before settling on haggling. “You get a hundred.”

“Hundred and thirty. You can take credit for the capture, I don’t care.”

“Deal.” He tried to pretend he thought about it before nodding, but Coraline knew the appeal of nobility was irresistible. The glint in his eyes earlier had not lied. “Just so you know, you were getting ripped off on that book anyway.”

“I figured when I noticed you lot. You don’t seem like you run after small game.” Never a bad idea to stick a compliment in. She sighed. “I’m never taking an Orlesian job again.”

Hook, line, and sinker. Now all she needed to do was get him -and Anders- away from those wards. He showed her the gold, which he gave to one of his men for safekeeping.

Anders, they brought on deck blindfolded and tied up, and Coraline had to grit her teeth to stop herself from simply lighting the ship on fire right there and then. He was limping, and the bruise on his cheek extended to his forehead. She hated that she was glad for the gag he had on him -at least he was unlikely to give her scheme away, and she did not need him to accuse her of blood magic on a ship full of pirates.

She turned back to the Captain. “It’s broad daylight. We can’t move him like this, that’ll attract all sorts.”

“How were you planning to get him there?”

“Lure him with the promise of some good time, if you catch my meaning.” She winked.

Stefano grimaced while his men sniggered behind him. Probably the noble birth. “To the docks?”

“He’s Orlesian, they’re all nasty.” She looked at Anders, pretending to think about it. “I say, get a stretcher, put a blanket over him. He’ll look just like a corpse. Do you got any paralysing stuff?”

“We’re pirates, girl, not apothecaries.”

“Yeah, me neither. I guess knock him out, that usually works too.”

With Anders unconscious on the stretcher, half the crew on deck, five men, plus the Captain, followed her into the narrow passages behind the docks, themselves followed by Maartok a safe distance away. The warehouse’s door was ajar when they arrived, just like she had left it earlier. Her spells would come in as soon as someone walked in them -she needed to make sure it was the Captain, not the two carrying Anders.

“It’s here,” she said, pointing at the door.

Stefano eyed her suspiciously. “You go in first.”

She rolled her eyes, as if the man’ paranoia was funny and unnecessary. “Whatever.”

She went in the warehouse. Her traps were just as she had left them; a line of invisible glyphs ready to spring five feet from the door, a tripwire halfway across the room, ready to drop poison-infused smokebombs from the ceiling, installed with the help of the tall Qunari, as she was too small to reach that high. And Anders’ staff waiting just behind the door, invisible from the outside.

The building was very dark, and very empty. Aurelius had insisted she chose an empty building for her dealings, unless she wanted to reimburse him for the loss of any goods. She walked to the other end of the room, deeper in the darkness, her footsteps resonating, and made some voice noises for a minute, then came back out. “He’s pissed at me for our little three-way, but he’ll do it.” She hit Anders with her foot, not too hard. “That one’s valuable. But we deal inside. Too many eyes out here.”

That they were in a back-alley surrounded by tall building with no windows did not seem to cross the Captain’s mind. But then again, it was the Crows she was pretending they were trying to evade, and their reputation preceded them.

He hesitated, then looked back. “Where’s the Qunari?”

“Took the goods entrance. He’s already inside.” That was a bold-faced lie, seeing as she had only asked Maartok to follow them until they stopped and then to simply go back to his forge. The Qunari hated violence and had no stomach for blood.

The Captain exchanged a look with the man who held the money and she cut his thoughts before he could get suspicious. “What, d’you really think l I was going to let the lot o’you screw me over the moment we got here? I don’t think so.” If she seemed afraid that they were planning something, it made it seem like she had no plans of her own.

“Enzo, Samuel, you stay here for guard. Antoine, Johnson, Roberto, with me. You,” he stared at her. “Anything funny and we keep you as a treat.” Rape threats. Very original. She rolled her eyes.

The Captain, who now felt very much in charge, entered first, followed by his men and then Coraline. As loosely planned, he was the first to get glyphed, paralysed instantly. She grabbed Anders’ staff and blocked the door with a Repulsion Glyph so that the two men stationed outside could not join the fight.

She put Anders in a force field, negating all damage he was about to receive. In the split second before the men reached her, she released a burst of intense cold, freezing all three of them -Anders was spared thanks to her previous spell. She hit one with the staff, toppling him over on the ground where he shattered. She cast a Crushing Prison on the second, getting the same effect.

Casting was faster with a staff. She hardly needed to think at all, which was good, because most of her brainpower was used to keep up her pain-managing spell.

She threw a shock bomb before the Force Field on Anders waned; the electric current combined with the ice killed the last man standing. There was only Stefano left, paralysed in her glyph, twitching from the lightning. Five seconds.

She cast Sleep when the glyph disappeared to give herself more time and she prepared her next spell to kill him quickly -there were still the men at the door, and she had little time.

The movement caught her by surprise. Stefano had resisted her spell, and he lunged at her faster than he had seemed capable of. She raised Anders’ staff to protect herself. It almost worked, but Anders’ staff was heavier than hers and she underestimated the energy necessary. Stefano got her left shoulder, the blade piercing all the way through. With her spell, she only felt the pressure on her skin just before the blade tore through it, the odd vibration when the metal hit the bone, and the warm liquid pouring out on her shoulder. She cast Mind Blast on instinct and ran away, putting a few steps between them before turning around and sending a jet of flames his way, furious.

The Captain melted in the blue heat of her fire, along with his blade and his hat. His blood was still boiling in a puddle on the ground when she lowered her hands.

It had been stupid and reckless, as conjuring up such heat was extremely mana-draining, and she found herself reeling, her pain-managing spell suddenly taking all of her focus. She saw the glyph by the door break and felt the Force Field on Anders dissipate.

_Fuck_. Stefano had been cleverer than she had hoped; instead of the two men, there were seven. Probably most of his sober crew, who had followed as reinforcements. Seven men without a captain, who knew one of their crewmates on the ground had been carrying the equivalent of a hundred a thirty gold sovereigns.

She could not cast any area spells, not with an unconscious Anders in the way. Throwing bombs at them were not an option either. She ran to the other side of the room, jumping over the tripwire.

Three of the men got caught in the other glyphs on the floor, paralysed for at least half a minute. Coraline started to feel a slight discomfort, in her shoulder, in her abdomen; her spell had started to slip away from her. One of the men tripped the wire and she could only be glad that Anders, near the door, was outside of the blast radius. She used what little mana she had left to raise a protective shield against the smoke and the poison before backing away from the could. Moving was getting harder, the pain coming back in slow waves, pressure mounting at the sides of her head.

She heard them choke on the poison, and then a blade swinging. The smoke cleared and a figure stood there, holding twin daggers, surrounded by four corpses. Assassin, judging by the black hood, the black mask, the black pants. They liked to colour-coordinate.

“Thanks,” Coraline said politely, using all her energy to sustain the last shreds of her pain-managing spell, the only thing still keeping her upright. Do not be rude to the assassin, especially not when they just saved your life. She glanced behind him at the three pirates still paralysed.

The figure bowed dramatically. “I’m Anaya’s fiance, at your service. She said you were in a spot of trouble.”

Coraline remained as cordial as possible, leaning on Anders’ staff more and more. “That’s nice of her.” A cold sweat rolled on her back, blood pulsing at her temples.

The assassin turned around and in one gesture threw three throwing stars towards the men. He had excellent aim. “So, you’re a friend of Zev too, huh?” Oh, this was either very good or very bad. Very good if the man was not lying, and very bad if he was. She checked her options. In the semi-darkness and with her state, he had the clear advantage. He laughed. “He got me out of the Crows. I’ve been trying to get word to him about the wedding, but he’s… well. Busy.”

“I know.” She paused, remembering a conversation by firelight. “Wait, you’re Aerin.”

“One and only. Did he tell you how pretty I was?”

Coraline narrowed her eyes. “Which Talon did you belong to?”

“Valisti.”

“Which city did Zevran bring you to?”

Behind them, the glyphs waned and the three pirates fell to the ground, dead for several seconds now. “Afsaana.”

“How?”

“He stuck me on a ship.”

“Name of the ship?”

“Siren’s Call. Are you done?”

“Mmh. Fine. Nice to meet you, Aerin.”

“What’s going on?” Oh, Anders was waking up. Coraline decided she could ignore both him and the pain for another minute and picked the bag of gold from the still-frozen shards of pirate pieces. “D’you have a pouch?” He threw her a small drawstring pouch. A couple of coppers tinkled inside.

She took a large handful – twenty five gold pieces, quadruple a farmer’s yearly wages and filled the elf’s pouch with it. It was too full to close properly. She threw it back to him. “Here, that’s your wedding gift. Get out of here.”

“Fen’Harel’s balls- Sorry.” He whistled. “Wow.”

“If you can, distract any potential guards on your way out.”

“For that much money, I would distract the Maker himself.” Aerin sauntered out.

“Cora?”

“Right here.” Taking was painful, now, her spell almost gone. The headache was almost worst than the feeling of blood running down her stomach and her back. They needed to get out of here, the place would be swarming with either pirates or guards or both soon. She hurried to his side, ignoring the burning, and cut off the rope on his writs, freeing his hands.

He removed his blindfold, his eyes still unaccustomed to the obscurity. “Well… This is embarrassing-”

“We need to leave. Now.” She helped him up, gritting her teeth, and almost made it to the door before doubling over.

In the light of the morning, Anders caught a look at her. “Andraste’s tits! You promised you’d rest in bed!”

“I lied. Fuck. We need to go.”

Anders’ healing spell hit her like a brick, blunt and forceful, making her loose her footing. He caught her as she fell. “You can’t walk,” he said. “Three steps and your gut will fall out.”

“One blood mage down, cheer up.” She had to hold back a scream at the pain speaking caused, but the sarcasm was worth it.

“That’s not funny! Give me a minute, I’ll do a quick fix before I can get a proper look later.”

She did not bother arguing.

Anders sat her down and crouched in front of her. Her tunic was absolutely wrecked. No amount of washing would ever get that much blood out. Her healer did not bother with poultices or stitches or bandages or even inspecting the wound, going straight for the magical equivalent of a bomb in a Chantry. She felt his magic call upon spirits in the Fade, loud and ringing and edging on desperate.

“This is going to hurt.” She appreciated the warning, as it gave her time to clench her teeth. Still, the spell felt like she was being split in two in a dragon’s jaw. She should know, that had almost happened once. She put all her willpower towards not screaming, as it would both alert the guards and distract Anders. The few seconds his spell lasted were enough to burn through every muscle in her body, leaving her with a hot, searing pain, the burning everywhere, colouring her vision red and ringing in her ears.

Anders cast another spell, infusing all her body with cold for a moment. The pain dissipated. She took two long breaths to be sure the next sound out of her mouth would not be a scream or an insult, and then opened her eyes.

“Let’s go.”


	12. Of Bruises and Religion

Coraline woke up in the afternoon, her morning expedition having exhausted her despite all of Anders’ wonderful healing. She looked at her abdomen, still bandaged but completely painless. In fact, her whole body was entirely painless, feeling like she was floating in jelly. She closed her eyes again. This was lovely.

“I might have overdone it a little.” She opened her eyes, too tranquil to be alarmed. Anders was sitting in the armchair, ‘Servant of the Crown’ in his hands, his satchel at his feet.

“Hello.” She cocked her head, having some trouble keeping her eyes fully open.

He chuckled. “Oh, yes. I’ve definitely overdone it. Wait a second.” Coraline watched as he concentrated to cast a spell. Her instinctive wards did not even come up, letting him do whatever he wanted. Her mind sharpened in the instant his magic met her.

“Huh. I can’t decide if this was the best or the worse experience I’ve had today. Definitely the weirdest.”

“Yes, I overcharged the relaxing part a little.”

Coraline shook her head to shake off the unnatural feeling. “That was neat,” she said. “Felt like drinking aqua lucidius, but without the hallucinations.” He chucked again, hesitant. She noticed he had not even changed, his tunic covered in what she guessed to be her blood.

They had not talked about anything in the morning, Anders busy with the emergency healing and Coraline falling unconscious in the middle of it.

“Your shoulder will be fine,” he explained. “I’ve done all I could for your stomach, I just want to make sure everything holds. Don’t worry, you’ll be running around in a day or two.”

She brought a hand to the bandages on her midsection. The pain had vanished, leaving her with only a feeling of mild soreness. “Thanks.”

“Mmh. That spell of yours… Please don’t use it again.”

She frowned, sheepish. “It wasn’t blood magic.”

“I know. It was still pretty stupid. The knockback effect could have killed you.” Coraline almost argued that without it, neither of them would be here. Well, she would be, but without any chance of recovery without a spirit healer. And he would be dead, his body probably fed to the fishes.

“But it didn’t, thanks to you.” She grinned at him, cocking her head like it was all very funny, even though it was really, really not.

He grinned, and then he did not, looking awfully earnest. “Thank you. For the rescue.”

“Well, letting my healer die would have been stupid of me.”

“I mean it. After what I said yesterday, you didn’t have to.”

“You think a couple of insults is enough to change my mind? I’ve saved your life half a dozen times already, it’s a damn sunk cost fallacy at this point.” She paused. “You still have a bruise.”

Anders’ hand went to his cheek, which meant he knew where the bruise was, which meant it was still painful. “It’s alright.”

“No, it’s not. You should heal it.”

He shrugged without enthusiasm. “I’m all out. I couldn’t heal a paper cut right now.”

The thought seemed to distress him slightly, so she smirked at him, cocking a mischievous eyebrow. “Do you want me to heal it with… blood magic?”

“Cora!”

She laughed, letting her head fall back on the pillows. “I’m kidding, I don’t even know how to do that. You’ve got to have something for bruises in your bag.” His shoulders lowered. He had probably been holding his spell the entire day to allow her some sleep. She gestured ‘come here’ with a hand. “Give me your bag. There’s bound to be something in there.”

He sat on the side of the bed gingerly while she ruffled in his satchel, holding jar after jar of ointment and letting him decide. He shook his head five time before letting her use a greyish cream that smelled a little pungent.

“It’s mostly daisies. And olive oil,” he said. She guessed he was filling a silence. She also guessed why.

She turned his head away from her, inspecting the damage. With the blindfold and the gag, she had not seen how the bruise opened into an actual wound on his cheekbone, or how something had cut his brow ridge. That meant a backhanded slap, one with a hand wearing rings. She reminded herself of how Stefano had screamed as he burned alive. ‘Hand me that towel.”

She watered it to clean the injury. There was no point applying healing poultices to dirty wounds, even she knew that. Anders winced away too many times, despite her doing her best to be gentle. She coated her hand with ice to make it easier. He leaned into her hand on instinct, the cold dulling the pain, mana pricking between their skins.

Applying the salve was easier, thankfully. She had to push his hair out of the way, unable to help herself from noticing its coppery undertones. The bruise extended to his left eye, almost black underneath.

“I’m sorry,” she felt the need to say. He turned his eyes to her, frowning. “They captured you because of my book.”

“The Midnight Compendium. They kept asking where it was.”

“Yes. I didn’t lie about the Magister looking for it. Amongst others.” Anders sighed. Coraline could see where a man’s fist had collided with his jaw -the bruise had the shape of knuckles. She felt him set his jaw when she put some ointment there, the light pressure of her fingers still painful. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine.” He chuckled, although he was frowning. “I should have been more careful.” He paused while Coraline spread the paste around with small circles. “The anti-magic wards...”

She kept her eyes on his skin, black and blue under the layer of ointment. “I know.”

“It was like-”

“I know.”

“I thought I was dying,” he whispered to himself.

Coraline stopped her movement. “Anders, I am so sorry. That wasn’t supposed to- I’m sorry.”

He looked at her, and even though he should have been absolutely furious about his capture, subsequent beating and the fact that all of it was her fault, she saw no anger. Instead, she heard him manage to make a joke. “It’s a shame I was unconscious for most of the rescue. I bet it was all very daring.”

Coraline released a breath she had not noticed she had been holding. “It was, you know. It involved a Vashoth Qunari, an ex-Crow, and the head of the local crime syndicate.”

“You’re joking.”

She liked the way he always said that, as a statement more than a question, as if there was simply no way she could be telling the truth. She shrugged, smirking mysteriously. “I know people.” The ointment covered almost a third of Anders’ face and neck. “All done. Are there anymore?”

“It’s fine, I’ll heal the rest later. Can you lay back down? I need to check your bandages.”

Coraline snorted. Anders was barely keeping his eyes open as it was. “You’re not checking anything. At least take a nap first.” She scooted over unceremoniously. “I’m even willing to share. Never let it be said I’m not generous.” She saw Anders hesitate, so she pushed a little, gently. “Hand me that book, that’ll occupy me while you snore.”

“I don’t snore!” He was right. Coraline had never heard him snore, but she was not about to let the truth get in her way.

“Yeah, you do.”

Anders sighed, then handed her ‘Servant of the Crown’ and settled down. He fell asleep before she even found her page, marked by the feather she had left in.

She finished the book quickly, flipping through the last pages as the elven spy and the Empress consummated their love, wondering if the book had been banned in Orlais. Probably. Anders was sleeping like a stone, his head against her arm. The ointment she had carefully applied on his face had transferred to the bedsheets and her arm, and she was beginning to get that itch to move one only gets when one cannot. She ignored it, fearing she would wake him if she moved. She grabbed a charcoal stick from her bedside table to doodle all over the romance novel. Her drawings all looked atrocious, but she had little qualms destroying that particular book.

He blinked to consciousness hours later, after the moon had risen in the sky. Of course, he insisted on redoing her bandages before going back home. She had thought he slept in a different room in the inn, but apparently he had a house, now. Or, well, not a house, but a room above a baker’s shop. Not to mention he had been roped in helping with a small hospital in the Trade Quarter.

“It’s not much, but it’s got everything I need,” Anders concluded his recollection.

“Can’t be worse than your Kirkwall sewers,” she noted pointedly.

“Hey, they weren’t that bad.” She raised a dubious eyebrow. “Really.”

“You keep telling yourself that. When do you start?”

“Well, I’ve already had a few patients. Allergies and hangovers, mostly.”

“Ah, the Festival.”

He smiled over her, concentrated on dabbing his poultices of her stomach. She was healing nicely, he had said earlier. “Mmh. A lot of burns, too.”

“Burns?”

“Idiots that try to set off homemade fireworks.” He shook his head. “There’s always a few, and they’re always drunk. I saw a man loose a hand over it once. It exploded right off his arm, took me forever to fix it.” Coraline’s eyes glazed over for a second. “You’re thinking of weaponizing fireworks, aren’t you?”

She looked mildly sheepish. “… No.”

“Please don’t try to reinvent gaatlok. I have no doubts you could, but I would like this building to stay standing. Anesu always gives me free food.”

“A man’s stomach. The greatest threat to progress,” she sighed dramatically while he threw away the bandages.

Coraline decided to deal with the elephant in the room. Anders seemed in a better mood, although still hurt and tired, and she was in no pain at all, which would simplify the conversation to come.

“About Gaxkang,” she started. Anders pretended her had not heard her, carefully re-bandaging her. He had said she only needed one or two days with the bandages, ‘just in case’. “Anders.”

“Do we have to talk about this?”

She considered it. “Well, no. I suppose we don’t.”

A moment passed and Anders lowered his head, shrugging. “I don’t understand it, I just don’t. Some things are simply wrong.”

Coraline sighed. In for a copper… “I started to hear the song. I know we’re supposed to have a decade or so, but I guess the Blight, and the Archdemon’s proximity… It accelerated it.”

“The Calling.”

She nodded. “I was afraid Al -King Alistair would start to hear it too. He doesn’t have any heirs, and there was too much risk involved with leaving Ferelden without a strong ruler.”

It was partly true, although that particular problem had already been dealt with. Anora and her had arranged a marriage for Fergus Cousland, and his new wife was with child. In the case of Alistair’s death, Fergus would have enough support in the Bannorn to rule Ferelden, and the line of succession was assured.

Anders stopped manipulating the bandages, raising his eyes on her with what almost seemed to be consternation. “You made a deal with a demon to stabilize Ferelden’s political situation?”

It was a good tale she was about to spin, one of honour and bravery. She might even make it about the plight of mages, about how Alistair was doing much for them and it would be a loss to their cause if he died young.

Anders was still looking at her earnestly, a little bemused and with black circles under his eyes. The half-truth refused to come out of her mouth. “It’s a little more complicated than that,” she sighed. “King Alistair refused to take the cure anyway. Went on about honour and duty and-” The thought that Alistair might end up dying alone in the Deep Roads forced her to look away, turning her head. She grit her teeth. She still had time to perfect the damn thing and get him to take it, she did not have to panic yet.

Anders narrowed his eyes, catching her expression. He let out a surprised sound. “I knew there were rumours, but...”

Coraline looked back at him. “What?”

“That the Kind of Ferelden and you, you know...”

She could not believe her ears, all thoughts of demons and politics forgotten for a moment. “What? Do people seriously- I can’t believe this. It’s Alistair. He doesn’t even wash his socks!”

“I just figured-”

“I mean, he’s got people to do it for him now, but still.” She paused, at a complete loss for words. “We’re friends,” she said finally, although it sounded too little to her ears.

“So, you made a deal with a demon to save your friend?”

“… That’s more like it,” she admitted. That was exactly like it, except for the part where she had tried to save herself too. A little selfishness never hurt anyone.

Anders went back to tying her bandages, shaking his head. “Well. Never let it be said that you do things halfway.”

She snorted. If only.

At least he seemed to believe her. She tried to reassure him. “I’m not stupid enough to pretend I’ve got it under control,” she pointed at the bandages, “but I never expected to in the first place. I’ve got half a plan and three quarters of a spell, it’ll be fine.”

“What is your plan, exactly? You said you trapped Gaxkang in the Fade.”

“I did, for now at least. You know how even if spirits die, some part of them might reform after a while? Like, centuries later? Well, I’m planning on being more thorough, which is why I needed the Compendium. I’m rearranging a couple of spells, it should vaporize Gaxkang into tiny tiny dust specks. No rebirth possible.”

“And the blood magic?”

She rolled her eyes. Of course that was what he was hung up on. “That was only for the Cure. I didn’t even use my own blood.”

He blinked at her, clearly aggravated. “How does that make it better?!”

“I mean, I used darkspawn blood,” she explained quickly. “You can’t make me feel bad about using darkspawn. It’s darkspawn! And besides, the Joining Ritual is _also_ blood magic, you know.”

She watched him with a half-smile while he threw his head back, closed his eyes, and exhaled loudly. “You do this on purpose, don’t you? You enjoy seeing me suffer, I know it.” They shared a glance and she had to look away to avoid laughing at his face. He was still pissed at her, but he was not really angry. “You should have known better than to trust a demon.”

“Trust? Of course I didn’t trust it, I’m not an idiot. It’s powerless to do anything this side of the Veil until Midsummer’s Eve, and it’ll be dead before then. I was planning on tricking it from the start.”

“You mean… You lied to it?”

“Of course I did! What did you think? That I would happily get myself or someone else possessed simply because I swore I would? Just because I make promises doesn’t mean I intend on keeping them.”

“That is… far more devious than what I thought you capable of.”

She cocked her head. “I choose to take that as a compliment.”

Anders smiled. A good smile, with his eyes sparkling. Coraline closed her eyes, relieved for reasons she was not sure she wanted to understand.

* * *

The next evening, Anders grabbed some pastries for Cora and made his way to the inn, where Anesu cornered him for a good twenty minutes. He had gotten used to the way she always greeted him, with a cup of tea and all the latest gossip.

The door of Cora’s room had been left unclosed and when he reached it, up on the second floor, his eye caught her figure. He held his hand.

She had never looked so unreal. She was sitting on the windowsill, the low sun rays caressing her raised profile. The sun made her curly hair a fire around her face, haloed in gold. Made her skin seem like soft, glistening silk, the somewhat sheer cotton of her tunic but a shadow on her skin. Her eyes were unfocused in thought, and he could not keep his from her.

His breath held in a moment’s silence.

His intrusion on something far too private struck him, standing unseen, a glimpse caught through a door left ajar. And yet he did not move. She replaced a lock of hair behind her ear and it fell back on her face instantly, like it always did. The light seemed to glide towards her, burning with the roses and oranges of the setting sun.

A cloud covered the sun for an instant, the ring of light around her disappearing with it, and he found his sanity again. He took a step back and knocked on the door, waiting a second before entering. The moment had broken; she looked like her usual self again.

That worried wrinkle on her forehead, that sharp, calculating gaze. That slight, sarcastic raise of the left corner of her lips. Those stiff shoulders, betraying the affect of someone used to leading. Anders swallowed, torn between his relief at seeing her and that odd, yet wonderful, image of her he could not shake.

“Evening,” she said.

“You shoudn’t-”

“Be up, I know, I know.” Her animated face contrasted so harshly with her peaceful expression moments earlier that it almost gave him whiplash. “I’m really better, though. Doesn’t hurt at all.”

“Not a reason for stretching limits,” he muttered, then out loud, “I’ve got pastries and a letter.”

She grabbed the letter like she grabbed the pastries; swift, enthusiastic, with an almost childish yearning in her hands. He felt himself burning with curiosity, as he had when he had helped her send her letter. At the time, he had asked no questions, too interested by the spell she had showed him. He could not help but wonder, who got to elicit such a smile from her at the mere reading of their penmanship on an envelop? A lover? A friend?

She put the letter away without even opening it, neatly placing in the drawer by the bed and ate a cream bun. He was not sure she even bothered chewing. “So, how was work?”

“A lady does not talk with her mouth full,” he joked.

She mumbled something that resembled “not a lady”, but it was hard to tell. “Looking good,” she added after she had swallowed.

He brought a hand to his cheek, painless once again, the bruises and the cuts gone. “Thanks to you.” He had healed himself with magic, of course, but it did not make it less true.

She rolled her eyes. “As if. You’re just being nice.”

He put down his satchel and pulled out bandages and poultices. Sat down on his usual spot on the bed, he recounted most of his day while untying -again- her bandages. By his reckoning, this would be the last time he needed to. It elicited a sigh of relief from him.

Two days ago, before she had managed to somehow come up with a solution to the mana surplus problem, he had thought her healing would have to be entirely non-magical, with all the dangers that came with that. He had not literally put her guts back where they belonged in order to see her die from sepsis. The image of her lying in a pool of her own blood less than a week prior still jolted him awake at night, in between nightmares about the Circle and darkspawn.

“I met with Hira again today,” he said. Hira lived in the forest, in a village of wooden houses mounted on stilts, some build into the immense trees. They called her the Oracle, because in addition to being a Seer, someone who sees beyond the mortal world, she had supposed powers of prescience. In the heavy penumbra of the forest, beyond the clear breeze of the open plains, beyond the endless rope bridges that led into the village, Anders could almost believe it. Almost.

“The wise woman?”

“Yes. The whole village… You should see it, the Veil is barely even there. Justice can come and go on either side like he wants, it’s...”

Her grin grew until it seemed to eat half her face. “Pretty cool, right?”

“You should have told me! I didn’t think such things were possible.”

She laughed in his face, wincing when the muscles in her abdomen contracted. She would be sore for a few days, still, but nothing to worry about. “Like you would have believed me. You’d have ran away screaming blasphemy.”

He grimaced, although it was good-natured and he even admitted she had a point. “I would have come back.”

She peered at him with narrowed eyes, all in jest. “You’d have gotten lost in the Antivan wastes, and then you’d have gotten eaten by hyenas, and then, one day, some random smuggler would have stolen your boots form your corpse.”

“Someone’s in a cheery mood.” He opened the salve he had prepared in the early morning, just something to make sure the scars would fade a little. Even though she had repeatedly said she did not care, if he could help, then where was the harm? “Can you imagine if the Chantry was more like that village? Without the fears of men, it could be-”

She made a face, almost the same she had made days prior when they had talked (or, well, _not_ talked) about the Chantry. Anders did not understand why she got so hung up on this in particular.

“What?” He asked.

“Nothing.”

“It’s funny,” he said. “Your heartbeat goes up when you lie.”

She looked down at his hand, still flat on her skin and he felt her heartbeat speed up; that was what she got for getting caught in a lie.

“Get your hands off me,” she snipped.

He obliged instantly. “How am I supposed to apply the ointment?”

“With your feet.” He crossed his arms, which he felt made his point eloquently enough. She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Do your healing thing.”

“Five years of training, over ten years of practise, and I do the ‘healing thing’,” he managed to complain, grabbing a new jar of salve in an overly dramatic movement.

She snorted. “Alright. You’re the best healer in the land, and I am blessed to be in the presence of one as great as you.”

“I feel like you’re not being completely sincere.”

“What could possibly make you think that?”

He went back to applying the salve he had just make. It was always more effective when applied fresh -adding oils to prolong conservation time tended to diminish the effectiveness and… What had they been talking about, again? He blinked in realization.

“You- You need to teach me how to do that.”

“What?” And she had the gall to pretend to look confused. The nerve on that woman.

“The misdirection! The change of subject! Are you sure you’re not a bard in disguise?”

She laughed as if he had not just caught her lie. Again. “Don’t they say I travelled with an Orlesian bard and an Antivan assassin during the Blight? I’m bound to have picked up a few things.”

“Wait, so the Antivan assassin thing is true? I always thought it was poetic licence on the Chantry’s part, I mean- No. You’re not doing this again.” He glared at her for a few moments while she tried to contain a very sly smile. “I know you think reforming the Chantry is a bad idea, but you could at least tell me why.”

She seemed to assess him, which was not a comfortable feeling. Her suddenly sharp eyes studied him intently as he tried to concentrate on not spilling the damn salve everywhere- he should have added more lifestone powder.

“Fine,” she seemed to give up. “I think it’s laughable. Not to mention undoable.”

“Why?” Her gaze shifted from him to the window to the door to him again; he had simply wanted to know what she thought, not try to pry her opinions out of her like a blacksmith would extract a tooth. “Nevermind,” he ended up saying. “You don’t have to tell me it you don’t want to.”

He went back to applying the salve, their banter brought to a still and the silence stifling.

“Are you sure you want to know?” She asked.

“Yes.”

“Alright.” She settled up against her pillows and put her hands behind her head. “The Chantry’s entire model is based on the exploitation of magic. The street lamps in Orlais are lit by magic. It’s the Tranquil who enchant their teacups and mages who do little spark shows for their entertainment. All the comfort the Chantry provides the nobles is why they keep supporting it. Without that, without the Templar army whose only purpose is to keep mages in chains and the support of the nobles, the Chantry is nothing. Without mages in their prisons, they’d loose everything, from political power to good old gold. Remove the exploitation of magic, and the Chantry goes up in smoke. Any reformation of the Chantry worth more than a copper has to go through its complete obliteration.”

In a way, it was vindicating to hear some ideas he had never dared think through from someone else. In another, it made a cry of ‘blasphemy’ grow in his chest, his religious education coming out in full force. He tried his best to stay rational. “You’re basing all of this on the premise that the Chantry is a political institution.”

“Well, yes. The worship of the Maker is, and forgive me if I offend you, a political tool first. The only reason the Chantry has any power anywhere is not because the Maker exists, but because Drakon needed an excuse to unite Orlais and justify the invasion of Ferelden and Nevarra a billion years ago. So he propped up the Chant, called us all heathens and said we needed to be civilized.

The Chantry only exists because it legitimises the Orlesian Empire, because its expansionist philosophy needs people to believe the whole ‘convert the whole world to save your souls’ bullshit. You can’t reform the Chantry into anything worthwhile, because you’d need to take down Orlais first.” She paused, then grinned. “Hey, there’s an idea.”

The beginnings of the Chantry were not secret, although they were usually framed as miraculous religious fervour and not as a petty excuse for a land-grab. Anders noticed, again, that she removed morality and faith from her arguments completely, instead keeping to the political angle. “Why wouldn’t it be possible to remove the political dimension of the Chantry and simply leave it as a religious, charitable organization?”

“The political dimension of the Chantry _is_ the Chantry. Remove that and you’ve got a bunch of pretty buildings and old women in weird hats. And since when is the Chantry charitable?”

“They do good works, too. Well, not in Kirkwall, but in Amaranthine, or in Denerim. I’ve been there, and they help people.”

“People?” She laughed. “Define people. They’ve never done anything for the elves, even the Andrastian faithful in the Alienages.”

“They run the orphanages. And hospitals in the South. Even you have to admit that’s a necessary service.”

“If I was spiteful, I’d argue the Chantry only takes care of the orphans because they make for good Templars -no loyalties to anyone but the Order. As for the sick, anyone in need of serious healing has no choice but to go through the Chantry as they’re the ones regulating access to magical healers. That’s a whole business model built on our imprisonment, it’s almost impressive.”

“You _are_ spiteful. And maybe a little right...”

“Ah!”

“… And exaggerating quite a lot. I’ve seen the refugees in Denerim’s Chantry during the Blight. That’s where the civilians hid during the attack on Amaranthine. Not to mention you’re completely disregarding the fact that even without the scheming and the politicking, people believe in the Maker.”

She snorted.

“You keep making this all about power and money-”

“Because it is.”

“-but you’re forgetting that people believe. Actual, genuine belief in His teachings.” Anders came to a conclusion he had suspected for quite a while now, from the way she rolled her eyes and dismissed him so quickly. “You can’t even understand what that’s like, can you? Don’t you believe? In anything?”

She replaced a lock of hair behind her ear. “I believe we all tend to wildly underestimate the place of chance in the world. Not everything has to mean something.”

“You don’t think there’s someone? Up there?”

“I don’t know. But I like to think it’s all just a big accident. No one watching over us. That for better or for worse, we’re alone with our actions down here.”

“That sound lonely.”

She laughed, the sound ringing in his ears. “Better to be alone than in bad company.” Calling the Maker bad company was beyond casual blasphemy, and Anders found himself unable to decide whether he should be horrified or awed by her.

She continued. “And even if I wanted to believe in something, which something should I choose? Between the Dalish Pantheon, the Avvar’s beliefs, that weird cannibalistic cult in the Frostbacks, the Chantry or the dwarves’ ancestor worship, there is not one that makes more sense than the others.”

She sighed, looking off towards the door. Anders observed her, almost expecting a bold of lightning to strike her down for heresy. It never came. He found herself lost in thoughts instead of trying to argue Chantry reform with her. She had a white scar under her right eye, barely visible in the right light.

“Even if all of that weren’t true and the Chant was just something people believed in.” Her words caught him by surprise, stirring him from his reveries. “Then what? You can’t simply change it all to be better. There are so many verses that would need to be removed, so many stories that would not make sense if you did. And so many Chantry Mothers that would cling to power with their dying fingers. It’s a losing battle.”

“They removed the Canticle of Shartan, why not the Transfigurations?”

She burst into laughter, loud and slightly hysterical, broken by pained ‘ows’ as her abdomen muscles contracted. Anders shook her head. Alright, so his analogy had been poorly chosen. The Canticle of Shartan gave a place of choice to the elves in the Chant, it was no wonder why the Chantry had removed it after slaughtering the elves of the Dales. Altering the Canticle of Transfigurations was a whole other matter and he knew it. Still, she did not have to mock him so joyously.

“Thanks for the laugh, that was great,” she managed to say, wiping off a tear. She did not even bother explaining what had prompted it, his mistake obvious enough.

“It could be altered,” Anders insisted. “If only to make more sense. If the Maker blamed magic for the Magister’s actions in the Black City, why would He still gift us with it?”

He remembered saying these exact words to Hawke. It had been so long ago, and yet he remembered the hope he had felt then. The righteousness that had tugged at his heart, the knowledge that he was right. He had been so callously dismissed, then. What’s so wrong with the way things are? Hawke’s words reminded themselves to his ears, mocking him, uncaring.

Coraline rose an eyebrow. “Nice bit of logic there. You’re assuming that, one, the Maker is real, and two, he’s not a complete arsehole.”

Anders looked up to the ceiling. Still no holy strike. And to think they had called him an extremist. The thought of Coraline ever meeting her cousin menaced to wash away what little sanity he had left and he closed his eyes, quelling the mad giggle that menaced to escape him.

“Coraline?”

“Yes?”

“Can we talk about something else? Anything else.”

She stifled another bout of laughter and leaned towards him playfully. “So, that cute baker… Tsitsi, right?”

* * *

Coraline left Ayesleigh discrete as a lover slipping away before the sunrise’s cold light. Not discrete enough, because she crossed Anaya in the hall, coming back from a night of partying. Judging by the slight balance issue, at least a little drunk. “Bella! I meant to thank you properly for the wedding gift.”

Coraline barely had the time to open her arms to receive Anaya, very happy and staggering.

She pat her on the head. “Oh. No problem, your Aerin saved my ass, I owed him. And you, for being cleverer than me and calling him for help.”

Anaya giggled, a hand in front of her mouth as if that would hide the noise. “He’s cute, isn’t he? There’s just… something about Antivans.”

“It’s the daggers I reckon,” Coraline dead-panned.

“Those leather pants are a big help, too. But you’re more into the robes and staff sort of man, huh?”

“I… am?”

She was not, to be honest. Her magic gave her an edge in case whoever was in bed with her meant to kill her, and bedding a mage would mean relinquishing that advantage for a tryst, which was very unlike her. Assassins were far less likely to resist an emergency Mind Blast than Enchanters.

“I mean, I get it, he’s quite sexy, in an exhausted sort of way. And those hands…” She winked.

“You’re talking about Anders?”

“Of course I am. Aren’t you two lovers?”

Anaya caught Coraline unawares. The thought that she would have any sort of chronic lover seemed genuinely odd. Chronic lover. She even made it sound like a disease. And Anders, on top of it. Preposterous. “Uh. No.”

Anaya narrowed her eyes. “You’re lying. You went and fought pirates to save his life. And then he spent an entire day healing you. It was all very romantic.”

Coraline had trouble seeing anything romantic in pools of blood and shards of people on the ground. “Trust me, it wasn’t. And healing people is literally is job.”

Anaya shrugged, almost falling down as she did so. “Your loss. Or his loss.” She studied Coraline, head cocked to one side. “I’m honestly not sure.”

Coraline rolled her eyes and told her to go to sleep.

* * *

A few hours later, when Anders came to the inn to tell Coraline she could finally remove her bandages, he found the bed made and a box with his name on it.

Inside, a pile of books, including Varric’s The Viper Nest (_It’s got assassins, you’ll love it!_ -he had already read it) and The Search for the True Prophet, long banned in Andrastian land, a new tunic (_To replace to one I ruined_), seventy five gold pieces, which left him open-mouthed for a couple of seconds (_Stole it from the pirates, thought you should get a share_), the drawing of the fortune teller’s tent he had wanted to buy but had not (_To liven up your new place_), and a short note.

‘_Anders,_

_You will forgive me for leaving so quickly, but I have work to do. I hope the next time we meet, it will be without the shadow of a demon over us._

_Take care of yourself._

_Coraline_’

He sat down on the bed and sent a prayer to Andraste that they would meet again.


End file.
